Flowers and Poise (HP Fanfiction)
by seasad
Summary: Rose Taylor didn't expect much. Yes, she'd moved across the world, and yes, she'd started a new school, but still, not very many expectations. She definitely did not expect to be separated from her twin sister at the first chance. Or for a pink toad to be teaching her favourite subject. And she most certainly did not see a sharp-tongued, grey-eyed boy coming her way.
1. Chapter 1

| Rose | 

Nobody noticed their abrupt arrival. The family emerged from the depths of the dark alley into the busy city life of London with not one second glance. Everyone was used the strange people here. The two younger girls pushed their trolleys behind their parents as they ducked into King's Cross station. People bustled around them, each rushing to catch their train or meet up with a loved one. Someone jostled Rose Taylor's side for the umpteenth time that day, and she found herself once again thinking how different things were from back home.

She was too busy peering at the throngs of never ending people that encircled her family to notice that her father had stopped ahead of her, and she almost ran him over with her cart. Grace Taylor's hand clamped firmly on Rose's arm to stop her from barreling into their dad. The former smirked at the latter, who rolled her eyes in response and muttered an "I would have had it."

Stuart Taylor looked back at his daughters and huffed a laugh. "Obviously it is too early for you two to be functioning, and I'd rather not be smooshed today. I'll grab us some caffeine and meet you guys at the platform." He turned towards the small coffee shop, then back around. "Want anything, darling?" he asked his wife.

Kara Taylor shook her head and placed a kiss on his cheek. "No thanks. But please hurry back, I don't want to be stuck too long with these two grumps."

"Hey!" The sisters yelled together and pouted at their parents. The family laughed before parting ways. The walk to platforms nine and ten was slow and silent. They kept having to swerve out of the way of hurrying crowds of people, and fighting for trolley space. The three were relieved, to say the least, when platforms nine and ten came into sight. But it was short lived.

"Um, where the hell is the platform?" Grace shrieked, stopping Rose in her tracks. They both scoured the place, but no platform nine and three-quarters could be seen. People bumped into the shocked group and hissed mean things in beautiful accents.

"Ok cool. Awesome. Great. Maybe this is all a trick. Maybe there is no Hogwarts. I mean, what kind of name is Hogwarts anyway?"

"Honey, the school is real, your father went there, remember?"

"Yes, yes, but –"

"Rose, it's ok. C'mon, let's go sit over there and wait for dad. He'll know what to do," Grace said, leading the other two to a wall not far from the platforms. Rose pulled her trolley to the side and fashioned herself a seat on her trunk, putting her head in her hands and running her fingers frantically through the strands of deep auburn hair.

Ten minutes or so passed in silence and there was no sign of their dad. "What if he doesn't come back in time and we miss the train? Or what if he comes back and he doesn't know the entrance? Or what if he doesn't come back at all because he got abducted by aliens and now we have no father? Or even –"

"Calm down Rose, your dad's fine. There's probably just a big line at the shop. If it'll make you feel better though, I'll go look for him." Rose nodded at her mum and slumped even farther into her hands. Kara kissed her daughters' heads before disappearing into a sea of people.

Grace plopped down beside her sister who seemed to be pulling out tufts of hair now. She grabbed Rose's hands in her own, noticing the chipped blue nail polish compared to her own sleek black

"It's ok, we still have at _least_ ten years before the train leaves, we'll figure it out before then ok? Don't worry, or you're going to go bald much sooner than anticipated. Your hairline is already receding." Rose looked up from her lap to scan the area around them. Nobody seemed to pay the two any attention, for which she was thankful. Everyone knew how much Rose hated attention.

"At least I can actually run my fingers through my hair. Yours would suffer in there forever," Rose teased, pulling her hands out of Grace's to tug on one of her curls. Grace was the only one who knew how to calm down Rose, no matter what the situation. The two could read each other perfectly and seemed to always know exactly what the other needed. Their friends seemed to think it was some kind of twin telepathy thing, but Rose and Grace just thought it was because they were each other's best friend.

They were twins, fraternal twins, though most people still couldn't tell the difference between the sisters in any case. Only in their subtleties could one tell them apart. Where Rose's face was narrower, Grace's was round. Rose was slightly taller, though they were both fairly short; however, what Grace lacked in inches, she made up for in hair. Her hair was a huge, curly mane, not unlike a lion's. It was a shade lighter than Rose's auburn, though both preferred to dye it dark brown. The only real difference between the two –if you don't count the hair –was their eyes.

Rose had eyes that seemed to change colour the more you looked. At first glance, they were an emerald green, piercing and wild. Upon closer inspection, the green unfolded into specks of sea blue, forest green and even a brilliant gold nearing the pupil. Depending on her mood, her eyes shifted in colour, from deep blue to vivid green. No one could deny they were beautiful.

Grace's however, seemed to have taken the colours of the forest and swirled them into an intense iris. The deep greens tangled up with the chocolate brown, cozy and dangerous, pulled in the onlooker. They were as captivating as they were intriguing, and no one would argue their splendour.

That was one of the only ways to tell the two apart; their eyes.

Rose continued tugging on Grace's ringlets, watching them boing back into perfection. The two sat in silence, observing their surroundings whilst waiting for their parents to come back. Time ticked by, and Rose became fidgety again. She had just opened her mouth to voice her concerns when a huge group of people walked by. They were mostly red-heads, but there was one lady with bright pink hair (which the twins looked at longingly, wishing they could pull off something like that) and a disfigured man with a weird-looking eye that stared at the two suspiciously.

Although, none of these people caught their attention. It was the two males leading the procession that made Rose do a double take.

"Holy shit, Rose, they're going top speed at the brick wall." Grace pointed towards two figures who were hunched over their own trolleys, racing towards the bricks between nine and ten.

Rose stared at them in horror. "What are they doing? They're not slowing down. Oh my god, they're going to die. What the fuck! Grace, what the fuck!"

Rose didn't know what to do. They were going much too quickly for her to stop them, she knew that, even as she stood up and reached out towards the pair. No one else seemed concerned for their safety, especially not the group of gingers who seemed to become rowdier the closer they got to the wall.

She covered her mouth in one hand, eyes fixated on the two who were surely about to crash. Even though she didn't want to watch it happen, she couldn't bring herself to look away. Grace was muttering swear words under her breath beside her, still sitting on the trunk.

It was going to happen. Any second now. She didn't want to see the bodies crumple, hear the smack, the screams –

And she didn't.

"What the fuck." Rose could hardly believe her eyes. The two were gone. They were just about to hit the wall when they disappeared. One second they were there, the next they weren't. It was almost like it was – magic.

Grace was still looking at the wall in disbelief when Rose pushed her off the trunk. "Hey! I was sitting there." She scrambled to her feet, glaring after her sister who had already forgotten the incident and was maneuvering the trolley towards the odd brick wall. Rose looked slightly demented in her determination to get there, a fact that was not lost on the rowdy group who quieted dramatically with her nearing presence.

Rose's mind was racing with possibilities, she hardly even noticed her approach or the quietness that ensued. Nine and three-quarters. Wall between nine and ten. Two boys disappearing. It's a freaking magic school! Of course there's going to be a magical kind of entrance. How could they be so stupid!

Everyone else was going about their day normally, paying no mind to the small girl stalking towards an unobtrusive wall and the group watching her apprehensively. Rose abandoned her trolley and took cautious steps towards the wall between platforms nine and ten. Her hand came up of its own accord, hovering in the space between her body and the bricks. Hesitantly, slowly, she reached out and prodded the barrier.

Rose's first thought was if anyone was watching her at the moment, they must think her completely crazy. Then, she herself thought she was losing it.

Her hand felt no resistance. It simply disappeared into the wall.

A muffled shriek escaped her lips as she recoiled her hand. She could hear laughter from the group behind her and made a conscious effort not to turn around. Not wanting to cause a scene, she took a couple calming breaths before tentatively sticking her entire arm through the wall and wiggling it around. She could not see it, but she could still feel the air rushing around it. This time Rose shouted in awe and delight. Yes, she'd been a witch for a while now and yes, she'd seen magic up close and personal, but it still managed to surprise her every time she was faced with it.

"What the devil do you think you're doing? Do you want the muggles to notice you with your arm in a wall? Constant vigilance! Either go through or step away."

Rose whipped around at the gruff voice, face red in embarrassment at both being called out and in fright at the stranger. Her wide eyes took in her audience. The group of red-heads were staring at her in amusement, but it was the distorted man from before that was right in front of her now. She opened her mouth for a retort or an apology –she hadn't quite figured out which one was best suited at the moment, but instead took in the appearance of the grisly man and hastily closed it.

Up close, he was much more frightening.

One of his eyes was normal, staring straight at her, while the bright blue of the fake one whizzed around its socket. His face was scarred and had chunks missing here and there. One of his legs was fake. The way he stood and carried himself oozed power and confidence. Overall, he appeared to either be some kind of badass pirate, or on the wrong end of some gang fights.

"I um, I – I didn't know, I uh, I didn't mean to, like, um," Rose stuttered over an explanation, not really getting anywhere. She frantically looked around for Grace or her mum or her dad or someone that seemed more willing to help than this weird man growing more impatient by the "um". She finally spotted Grace, who was of course, talking to a group of cute boys. Typical.

A hand grabbed Rose's arm, tightly, and alarm bells started ringing. The man was dragging her away from the wall, quite forcefully, toward the red-heads. She panicked and reacted instinctively. Grabbing a hold of the man's wrist with her right one, Rose wrenched it off her left arm and twisted it backwards along with the rest of his arm. She pushed her left hand on the bend of the man's elbow and he grunted in pain.

"Don't fucking touch me," Rose hissed at the man, applying more pressure on his bent arm. She knew she couldn't hold this much longer; the man was definitely much stronger than she and would get over his surprise any time now. "Grace!" Rose called as calmly as possible. "Could you try to stop flirting for five seconds and come over here please?"

Grace's eyes widened as she took in her sister's situation and hurried over, forgetting the boys completely. In the seconds it took for Grace to get to her side, one of older red-heads had sidled up as well. He looked to be about their dad's age, with horn-rimmed glasses. Perhaps the father of the clan.

Not that it really mattered to Rose at this minute. If the freaky guy was with these ginger people, then they were all the enemy. So she glared at him. She knew they were outnumbered by a lot, they were only two teenagers after all, but she figured being a girl in a public place with two strange men could help her out if need be. "Can I help you?" Rose snapped at the red-head, her voice harsh.

The man held up both his hands in the universal sign of surrender. "I mean you no harm, and neither did he," he said, nodding to the weirdo in Rose's hold. Funnily enough, he wasn't even struggling against Rose at all. "I'm sorry if he startled you, Alastor doesn't really know how to deal with people in a normal way. If you could let him go, we could talk about this rationally."

He seemed sincere. He also didn't seem like much of a threat, which eased Rose's protective instinct. She studied him thoroughly though, head to toe. Her eyes focused on the pocket of his jacket where there was an outline of a long, thin stick. A wand, she thought. So these people were magical, like her family. Rose made deliberate eye contact with each of people in the entourage, glaring at them in a way that clearly stated if they pulled anything, they'd be sorry, including the huge, black snarling dog she hadn't noticed before. Then she hastily let go of who she supposed was Alastor, pushed him roughly away from her and Grace, and took a small step back.

"Ok, now talk." The twins regarded the group coolly, arms crossed and scowls prominent. Alastor growled at the two, glowering intensely at Rose and rubbing his arm. Rose shot back a sarcastic smile.

"You were going to raise suspicions if you didn't get away from that damned wall. I was trying to help you," Alastor barked, still glaring.

Rose laughed. "Yes, because assaulting a teenage girl in a crowded place isn't suspicious at all. Maybe if you looked around, you'd see that your stunt attracted much more attention than I ever did."

She was right. The boys Grace was talking to were staring at the group in concern. A family of three kept glancing over to make sure the twins were okay. Onlookers left a wide berth between themselves and the group, but they all looked at the scene curiously.

"For Merlin's sake, these muggles don't know anything. Listen here, you shouldn't have been standing there for so long, or shrieking so loudly. There's a hidden entrance for a reason, and if you were there for any longer somebody else would have noticed."

"Well you shouldn't grab strangers tight enough to bruise and then expect them to be alright with that."

"I wasn't going to hurt you, I was –"

"How the hell was I supposed to know you weren't trying to hurt me? For all I know, you could have dragged me off to an alley somewhere where no one would hear me scream. You certainly look the part."

Alastor looked insulted, at the fact she thought he'd hurt her or because of the appearance comment, she didn't know. King's Cross Station was getting busier with each passing moment.

"Will you keep your voice down? You're drawing more attention than your number before."

" I honestly don't care. I've done nothing wrong. You're the one who came up to me, you're the one who yelled at me, _you're_ the one that handled this situation completely wrong. _Do not_ try to blame this on me. I'm the one with bruises on my wrist." Rose's eyes glinted dangerously. Who did this guy think he was, hurting her then not taking the blame?

Grace looked nervously between her sister and Alastor. She knew enough by now that when Rose's eyes did that, she had to put a stop to it as quickly as possible. She put a hand on her sister's shoulder, pulling her back. Her hand trembled, not because of her own nerves but because of how angry Rose was beneath it. Not a good sign.

"Rose, come on, we should go find our parents, and I left all of our stuff over there so anybody could steal it. Come on... Rose, please."

Rose wasn't listening. She was too busy thinking of ways to kill this man in a bloodless fashion.

"Girls, there you are!" The arrival of her parents brought Rose out of her stupor, and she finally looked away from Alastor. Grace let out a big sigh of relief. She hated having to deal with Rose when she got like this.

Their parents looked between the group of red-heads, Alastor and the other guy, and their daughters. "Seriously?" their mum looked to Rose. "When I left you were panicking and now you're fighting with an Auror? You couldn't have waited until you were with people your own age?"

"He started it," Rose mumbled. Which was true.

"Arthur, so good to see you again! Of course, I didn't expect to meet up quite like this but I guess it'll do."

The red-headed man with the glasses chuckled and shook their dad's hand. "Likewise Stuart. I'm guessing these beautiful young ladies are your daughters?"

What the hell. Did Dad know these people? Guilt tightened Rose's stomach. If they were friends of her dad, then she'd feel at least a little badly about what happened. _Then again_ , she thought, looking at Alastor who was still glowering at her, _maybe not._

Their dad came up behind the twins, passing them their teas and hugged them. "Yes, this is Rose and this is Grace. Like I told you at work, they're starting Hogwarts today." Rose forced a smile at her name and sipped her tea. "Rose here," he patted her shoulder, a little harder than necessary, making her tea slosh out of the cup, "was freaking out a little bit because she couldn't find the platform." The red-heads sniggered in the back. The twins glared at them.

"She found it all right," Alastor said.

Stuart looked at him a little weirdly. "Well that's good. How's it going Mad-Eye? You alright?" Grace and Rose shared a look before all the tension between them finally disappeared and they laughed so hard, they had to hold onto each other to keep from falling over. Everybody looked at them then, but they were too busy dying of laughter to notice.

"Ignore them, it happens all the time. I'm Kara by the way. You work at the ministry too, right?" She stuck out her hand to shake Arthurs.

As the adults started talking, the girls slowly calmed down.

"Well that was interesting."

Rose looked at her twin and shook her head. "So interesting. At least we know I still remember shit from karate."

The two stood quietly off to the side, sipping their tea and listening to the adults talk about work. Apparently their dad worked with Arthur. Awkward.

"Hey mum, we're gonna go grab our stuff. I kind of left it over there when Rose..." Grace trailed off awkwardly. "And we should probably get going. The train leaves at eleven and," she checked the time, "it's almost quarter to."

The two made their way over to their stuff, stopping first to collect the trolley Rose had left by the wall, then to the Grace's trolley. Nobody was looking at the group anymore, perhaps because of the arrival of their parents or maybe because of the laughing fit the two had done. Either way, there were no longer eyes on their backs and that made Rose happy. At the time she was too mad to care about who saw her, but now she let her embarrassment creep onto her cheeks and kept her head down.

"So, how many numbers did you get?" Rose asked, leaning against the wall while Grace tried (and failed) to heave her trunk back onto the trolley.

"Well, you know how well these accents work."


	2. T W O

| Rose | 

"Accents are really hot," a voice said from behind the twins.

"And we don't get very many at Hogwarts," said another.

They both turned, Grace giving up on her trunk, to see the newcomers. There were four of them, three red-headed and another with bushy, brown hair. It seemed like the two closest to Rose and Grace were the ones that spoke, mostly because the voices were male and these two were of the male specimen, but also because they seemed the most interested.

"Uh, hi?" Rose said, never having been a particularly good people person.

"Hi there," Grace smiled, looking them up and down, making it very obvious she was checking them out. Rose rolled her eyes. Grace had a switch inside her that was almost always turned on; if any male was around she had to flirt.

The two boys –men maybe? –looked exactly the same. Attractive being their main attribute. The other red-headed girl was obviously their sister, also very pretty as was the brown haired girl. What do they put in the water over here that made everyone so attractive?

"Need any help with that, love?" asked one of the twins, nodding to Grace's trunk.

Grace bit her lip, nodding. "I need help with a little more than that," she mumbled and smirked a bit.

"Sorry, didn't quite catch that," the other said. Rose elbowed Grace in the ribs and sighed. She dealt with this way too often.

"Oh, you really wouldn't mind? Thank you so much, that's so sweet of you! It seemed to have gotten heavier than when I took it off." Grace smiled brilliantly at the two, biting her thumb nail in a cute manner. The red-headed twins got the trunk back onto the trolley in seconds, then just stared at Rose and Grace. Grace basked in the attention; Rose drowned in it.

The ginger girl coughed and elbowed her brothers. "Right, we should probably introduce ourselves. I'm George, this here is Fred –"

"The devilishly more attractive twin!" Fred interjected.

"Ya, ya, sure you are, that's –"

"I'm very much capable of introducing myself, thank you. Hi, I'm Ginny," the red-headed girl smiled in a mostly friendly way. The girls smiled back and waved.

"And I'm Hermione Granger." The last girl stuck her hand out for the twins to shake, which they did, a little awkwardly. People their age didn't really shake each other's hands when they first met back at home. Apparently people in England were much more sophisticated.

"Well I'm Grace, and that's Rose, in case you didn't hear our dad mention that earlier."

"We did actually, though we were still too busy laughing over seeing Mad-Eye at your mercy," Fred said. Rose was looking off to the side, not wanting to be a part of the conversation. It took her a while to realise he was talking to her. "His face was brilliant." The twins started laughing again, Ginny chuckling a little and even Hermione cracked a smile. Rose blushed and looked down.

"How did you learn how to do that?" asked Ginny .

"Oh," Rose said in a small voice, clearing her throat a little. "Our mum forced us into karate because she wanted us to learn how to defend ourselves the No-Maj way. I panicked a little when that guy touched me and reacted on instinct." She shrugged a little sheepishly and continued staring at the asphalt.

"Rose gets a little paranoid at times and feels like most things are a threat. One time when we were younger we were playing hide and seek, and it was my turn to seek. She was hiding in a bush and didn't realize I found her, so when I grabbed her she was so scared that she singed off the ends of my hair by accident. I smelled like burned hair for a week."

As the others laughed, Rose shrank more into herself and felt like her face would never go back to its normal colour. Sensing her discomfort, Grace took away the attention.

"So how old are you guys?" She mostly directed the question at the boys, but Hermione was the one who answered.

"Well I'm fifteen and in fifth year, Ginny is fourteen and in fourth year and the twins are seventeen and in their last year at Hogwarts. We're all in Gryffindor too."

"Oh right, there are four houses right? Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, that's the one our dad was in, Slytherin and something else," Grace said, crossing her arms under her boobs to push them together a little more. The boys tried not to stare.

"Jigglypuff?" Rose volunteered, then immediately regretted it when the four Gryffindors laughed.

"It's Hufflepuff," Ginny snickered.

The twins shared a look. "What the fuck," they both paused and looked at each other again, "is a Hufflepuff."

The others laughed again, a bit uproariously. Rose and Grace looked back at them, completely serious. When they finally calmed down, George said, "Trust me, we've been asking ourselves that same question for years."

"Oh hey, we should probably head back, the whole reason we came over here was to fetch you two," Fred told them. "Not that talking to you wasn't a priority as well. It most definitely was." The twins winked at Grace who smirked right back.

Rose rolled her eyes and started steering her trolley, and if she 'accidentally' trod over one of the twins feet with the wheel, well, woops? She shrugged off Grace's glare, before Grace started a conversation with Fred and George on the way over to their parents.

"So how old are you two?" Hermione asked, filling the awkward silence between the three girls. Rose was used to those kinds of silences; she normally caused them.

"We're fifteen, like you. I guess that makes us fifth year." Rose shyly smiled, mostly because Hermione was actually trying and that deserved a smile.

"Do you know what house you want to be in?" Ginny asked this time.

"Well, I don't really know what each of the houses represent, but I guess I hope I'm in Ravenclaw because that was my dad's house." She smiled fully this time. Rose was a total daddy's girl, and would be ecstatic if she were in the same house as her father. "Of course, I better be in the same place as Grace or I'll probably die."

That thought had just occurred to her. What if she and her sister were separated? Worry clouded her mind as they reached the adults. They were all laughing at something Arthur had said. Bubblegum lady and the dog were nowhere to be seen. She couldn't be bothered to participate in anything and chewed on her bottom lip instead. Grace and Rose were quite different, but they were so similar at the same time. How do they even pick which house you go into anyway?

"Well, they place this all knowing hat on your head and it looks into your mind and sees which house would be best suited for you," their dad said.

"Did I say that out loud?" Rose asked, looking around at all the people looking at her.

"Yes," her mum said, smiling at her daughter and squeezing her shoulder comfortingly.

Rose grimaced. Then another thought occurred to her. "Dad, why didn't you tell us any of this before? Also, why in the world did you not think to inform us how to get to the platform?" she narrowed her eyes at her father who simply shrugged.

"I wanted to see your reaction when you found out we had to go through a wall, and apparently it wasn't one to be missed," he laughed and glanced at Arthur who looked like he was trying not to. Mad-Eye growled. Rose glared and felt her shoulders come up. She had forgotten he was there.

"I have a question for you, Miss Rose," Mad-Eye stated. His one eye was staring straight at her while the other kept whizzing. Looking at it made Rose feel sick.

"What," Rose said bluntly through gritted teeth, glaring at him. Just because her parents were there didn't mean she didn't feel any less hostile towards him.

"Rose!" her mum chastised for her rude behaviour.

Rose's body tensed and she was thoroughly annoyed with her mum for making her be polite to this guy. "I mean, yes, whatever can I do for you kind sir?" she batted her eyelashes in faux innocence. Mad-Eye did not appreciate it.

"I was just wondering how, exactly, you knew where the entrance was if your father never told you." He said it as though he were interrogating some sort of criminal and was trying to trick them into an answer. Rose did not appreciate _that_.

"It's quite simple really. In fact, it has to do with two people in your group," She smiled sweetly. "See, when you think people are about to crash to their death, you kind of pay attention. Especially when those two just suddenly disappear without any loud crash. Or screaming. Or blood. Just poof!" Rose made a gesture with her hands. "Gone." She was talking slowly, as though to a child. "And considering they went through the wall between platforms nine and ten –and the platform is nine and three-quarters, I figured I'd investigate. Of course, you know the rest, don't you dear Mad-Eye?" Rose's smile was as sweet and fake as Splenda sugar.

The two had a stare off for a while. She heard one of the twins say something about how she's not as shy as she comes off to be, to which Grace replied they didn't know the half of it.

"Well," Stuart said, breaking the tension, "we should all probably head to the train. It should be taking off soon and you really don't want to miss it because I am most definitely not driving you all the way to Scotland." His hand was pressed firmly on Rose's shoulder, guiding her towards the barrier. Grace flirted some more with the twins, Ginny and Hermione were talking and her mum was laughing with Arthur. Mad-Eye glared at Rose in contempt. Rose waved.

"You really shouldn't egg him on Rose. He could do some damage." They walked together, him pushing her trolley. He was looking calmly straight ahead towards the barrier, but his tone betrayed his worry.

"So can I," Rose pointed out. Stuart nodded his head in agreement, though that was what worried him the most.

She suddenly noticed how tired her dad looked. The bags under his eyes were massive, and his hair –what was left of it anyway –was even greyer. Looking at him, you wouldn't be able to tell he was handsome as a young man, with a full head of dark hair, shocking bright hazel eyes and a mischievous smile. His good sense of humour and great people skills were probably what attracted most people to him. He could go somewhere for twenty minutes and come back with at least five people's life stories. People just seemed to like him.

Rose stopped walking. She pulled her dad back by the hand and stared at him. "Are you getting enough sleep daddy? You look exhausted."

He smiled and patted her arm. "I'm fine, I just didn't sleep very well last night. Too busy worrying about you two going off to a new school." His English accent was very noticeable lately, most likely due to being back in his home country. Rose opened her mouth to reassure him but he held up his hand. "I know you'll be fine but it is a father's job to worry." Rose hugged him for a long time, long enough that the others had caught up with them. They pulled back and continued on their way to the platform.

After passing through the barrier the proper way, ("Ron and Harry should know better by now, especially now-a-days!") in small groups and indiscreetly, everyone parted ways. The Weasleys and Mad-Eye made their way to Bubblegum Lady and the dog, who stood with two male figures Rose knew well, but Rose stopped Arthur before he could pass and gave a timid apology.

Arthur looked confused. "What are you sorry for?"

Rose was looking anywhere except for him, thinking of the awful way she first treated him. "Well, I was very rude to you when you first came up, Mr. Weasley, and snapped at you. So uh, I just wanted to say sorry." Her face was bright red (again) and she played with her ring finger nervously.

Mr. Weasley raised his eyebrows in disbelief before giving a little chuckle. "Rose, don't even worry about it. If the positions were reversed, I would have done exactly the same thing. You didn't know who I was, and I very well could have been a threat. We all have to be very wary, especially now." His eyes, which were at first amused turned serious. Rose glanced at them once before looking away, and gave a small "Ok". He clapped her on the shoulder, and headed off to see the rest of his family.

She stared after him. Fred, George, Ginny, Hermione and the two guys were all huddled together. She wondered what they were talking about so secretively, but got her answer when she noticed the periodic glances they were all giving her. Rose huffed and turned her back to them, making her way to her own family. She could feel their stares on her back. She flipped her hair over her shoulder, hoping for some kind of shield. She could just imagine what they were saying about her. "She's so strange." "A freak." "She's got some anger issues on her, that one does."

Rose always wished she were one of those people who didn't care what others thought.

"Thank god you're finally here, mum's driving me crazy," Grace whispered and pulled Rose to her side. She thought Grace might be being a little bit dramatic; she had only been gone for a minute or two, but after five minutes of nagging, she too thought she might be going mad. Their mum was talking non-stop, reminding them to take their pills and to write to them every day and to eat properly and so on and so forth.

"–make sure to do your homework too, we don't want you two to fall behind. Though, we don't know yet if the curriculum is different from your other school but either way you have to work hard and I expect good marks or there will be punishment in the form of no baked goods, and Grace you cannot go boy crazy, you have your studies you need to focus on and Rose, I know you've been struggling with your anger but please try not to get into too many fights, we don't want a repeat of last time, so Grace I expect you to watch out for –"

Rose flinched and was glad when her sister cut her off. "Mum, we've got it. We understand what we have to do, you've literally gone over the same thing since the day Dad got the job."

"Right, right, sorry I know, I just get worried about you two, in a new country with new people and a new school –"

The train's high pitched warning whistle drowned out the rest of their mum's worried speech that the twins could probably have recited by heart. Their dad –whose absence Rose had not noticed before due to their mum's incessant talk –appeared suddenly, luggage-less.

"That would be your cue. I suppose your mother has gone over everything that's needed to be said –and more?"

"Most definitely," Grace muttered.

"Hey! Excuse me for caring about the well-being of my children. I just want what's best for you two, and everything is just so _new;_ new country, new school –"

"New people, yes, yes we know, we did actually just go over that fact about two minutes ago," Grace said.

Rose pulled her mum into a side-hug. "Relax mother, Grace and I will be perfectly alright. We'll look out for each other, and there won't be anything to worry about! We're really good at that, aren't we Grace? Grace?"

Grace looked disbelievingly at her. Ok, so maybe Rose didn't have a perfect track record, but for the sake of reassurance couldn't Grace have gone along with it for one second? Rose nudged her sister. "Right! Ya, definitely, we'll be totally fine together, looking out for each other and all that cool stuff. Nothing to worry about." Grace plastered on a smile and blinded their mother with it.

"That was convincing."

"I try."

The train whistled again, the platform quickly clearing of teenagers. There was yelling everywhere as parents called quick goodbyes and handed them things they had forgotten. Doors to the train were being yanked open and closed relentlessly. Everyone was frantic, except the family of four.

"You really need to get going now if you don't want to miss the train. And the compartments fill up really quickly. Of course, then you could meet new people and maybe make friends. I remember in my first year when I got on the train I was so tiny and ducked into the first compartment I could find and there were these two people in there already and they were really going at –" he stopped talking abruptly. The three females stared at him until their mum smacked him over the head, lightly of course.

Their dad cleared his throat awkwardly. "Anyway, I think you'll find good friends in the Weasleys. They'll help you two adjust. Arthur has already helped me with the new job. That family is very kind..." he trailed off and looked towards the red-heads, caught up in his thoughts.

Their mum pulled the two in for a very tight hug. "I love you both so much. Please be careful this year. Please." The hazel of her mum's eyes bore into Rose's urgently. She shrank away from them. Message received.

"Love you too," she mumbled, hugging her dad quickly and rushing up the steps to the train.


	3. Chapter 3

| Grace | 

"Anything from the trolley dears?" the old lady asked, peering into the compartment.

The two girls were sprawled out on their respective seats, totally invested in their books. They had the compartment to themselves, mostly because whenever someone came to the door, Rose made it very clear she did not want anyone bothering them. She had an exceptionally intense glare that could be turned on like a switch, as Grace definitely knew; she was almost always on the receiving end.

"It's too intense, you go," Rose waved Grace on, too fixated on her book to even look up. Grace stared a hole into the side of Rose's head until she finally spared a glance. "What?" she asked, irritated.

Grace rolled her eyes. "Fine, but I'll need some money."

"Use your own money."

"Um, our parents gave you the money."

"Oh –right. It's uh, it's in my bag," she said distractedly.

"Where in your bag?"

Rose sighed in exasperation. "I don't know! Just look in my bag, my book is too good right now for me to be talking."

"Ok, holy shit, calm down." Grace rummaged in the bag until she found a small pouch with a bunch of weird coins inside. She quickly walked the few steps out into the hallway and closed the compartment door, apologizing to the old lady for the wait.

"Uh, do you have anything chocolatey in there?" Grace asked. She was not yet familiar with the U.K. delicacies, and everything on the trolley looked foreign but pretty good.

"Well, we have chocolate frogs and cauldron cakes if you're looking for something sweet," the food trolley lady said.

"What are those?" she asked, pointing to a bag filled with long, multi-coloured gummies.

"Those," came a deep voice from behind Grace, "are jelly slugs." A tan hand came over her right shoulder, almost grazing her arm as it picked up a packet. She shivered at the unexpected proximity and quickly spun around.

The person attached to the hand was beautiful.

Well, his chest was.

But as she craned her neck and looked up, she realized the rest of him was beautiful too. He was dark-skinned, had deep brown eyes that bore into hers and a strong jawline. All features she admired. Plus he was tall (or she was just short). That was most definitely a bonus.

Grace could feel heat on her cheeks, which was weird. Her cheeks never heated up. Don't cheeks only get warm when –?

She glanced quickly at her reflection in the window of the compartment and wanted to die.

She was blushing.

Grace Taylor was a red- cheeked, blushing bimbo.

Grace Taylor never blushed.

The two stared at each other. Only for a few seconds, but Grace had never felt like this before around an attractive boy. By now she would have made some cute, flirty comment and made sure he knew she was interested. Instead all she wanted to do was get away. Get away from this beautiful boy that was making her stomach roll with just a look. The fuck was this shit.

"Is that all you want dear?" the trolley lady asked the boy, kick-starting Grace's mind. She took a huge step to the side, and pretended to browse the selection.

"And some of these please," he said, plucking a package of what looked like red licorice. She followed his hand with her eyes, watching him pull out some of those weird coins and handing them to the lady. Grace made the mistake of looking too long and once again met his gaze. This time though, he smiled.

It was big and toothy and really quite endearing. She wanted to smile back coyly, perhaps add one of her famous lip bites and hair playing, but all that came out was a small, shy smile, one that was fit for Rose.

"Those are licorice wands, in case you wanted to know," he said.

"Oh," was all Grace could make out. She cleared her throat and tried again. "I might get some of those for my sister, she really likes regular licorice, so I suppose she'll like these too." She picked up a packet of those, along with some Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans that she heard were good and the two chocolate treats.

"Are you sure you want to get those?" he asked, nodding his head to the Bertie Bott's package. "You seem to be new at this, and when they say every flavour, they _mean_ every flavour." He didn't say it in any mean way. In fact, he said it with a soft concern that made Grace feel even weirder.

"I think I'll take my chances. Thanks though." She smirked at him and bit her lip. She may not feel like herself, but she would never let this guy know that. Fake it until you make it.

"That'll be four sickles and three knuts, dear," the lady said kindly.

Grace looked blankly at her. Then down to the pouch with the money. Then back to the lady. She really wished she had paid attention to when her dad had explained the coins to them.

"Uh, are the sickles the gold guys? Or wait, I think they're these small things. And the knuts might be –" The boy put his hand over her frantically searching one. The touch alone made her already pounding heart go into triple time, and she looked up at him to see a small, amused smile on his really nice lips.

"It's alright love, I've got this one." He pulled some coins from his pocket and gave them to the lady (turns out the sickles are silver and the knuts are small and bronze) (so then what are the gold ones?).

"Sorry, I don't quite have the currency down yet," Grace admitted sheepishly, turning to face the pouch in her hand instead of him. "Here –" she rummaged in it until she found the amount of each coin he had spent and tried to give it to him. He shook his head and took a step out of reach of her outstretched hand.

"No, it's ok. I told you, it's on me," he winked, and Grace thought her face might explode from warmth because _holy shit that was hot._

"Oh, ok. Well, uh, thank you...?"

The compartment door a couple down from hers opened and a boy with sandy hair poked his head out. "Dean! C'mon lad, we're about to start up another game and you're supposed to be on me team."

The boy –Dean –didn't stop staring Grace in the eye as he walked backwards toward his friends. "It's really no problem. I guess I'll see you around."

And then he was gone.

Grace kept staring at the closed door he just went through, face red and heart still pounding.

That was weird. That was really weird.

"I guess you found something sweet after all," the lady said innocently, continuing down the corridor.

Grace was noticeably distressed when she came back into the compartment. Not that Rose paid her any attention; she was still way too immersed in her book to note how shaky her sister was.

Grace collapsed onto her seat and leaned her head against the window. The cool glass helped to reduce the red that lingered on her cheeks from her less than average (for her, at any rate) interaction. She watched the scenery outside –or tried to at least. With the speed of the train, all the greens of the trees blurred with the blue of the sky and created a never ending line of colour. She thought of how fast the train must be going to get to Scotland by early evening. Magic must help with that case. If only magic could help get rid of the blush that was still on her face.

It was the banging that finally caused Rose to look up.

"Um, what exactly are you doing?"

"What the fuck does it look like."

"Well, starting the year off with a concussion isn't exactly one of your best ideas."

"Well, being awkward in front of such a cute guy wasn't a good way to start the year anyway!" Grace's voice got louder with each bang of her head on the window. The glass was rattling even more now with the sway of the train and the added pressure of her hits.

Rose didn't know what was happening. Yes, Grace had always been dramatic, but this seemed to be a bit excessive. She opened her mouth to comment, but –

"Shut up! He's only a couple compartments down!"

"I didn't even say anything!"

"You didn't have to! Oh my god, how could I be so stupid? He was so cute and sweet and _pretty_ and he paid for us, he _paid for us_ and was all like "Oh no, it's on me" like who does that? Only perfect people and he is so obviously perfect!" Grace jumped up and paced the small space, running her hands through her hair in her obvious agitation only for them to get stuck.

"So what'd he buy us?" Rose asked, eyes following her sister back and forth across the compartment, fighting furiously with her hair.

She got the answer when it hit her head.

"Oh sweet, licorice!" Rose ripped open the packet and bit the top off.

"Now is not the time for sweets!"

Rose looked at her like she was an idiot. "It's always the time for sweets you dumbshit."

That was met with another item being thrown at Rose's head. Bertie Botts.

Grace sat back down in defeat, head in hands. She kept whispering to herself, but Rose could only make out the word "idiot".

"–I'm such an idiot, he's going to think I'm a loser, idiot, idiotic, fuck –"

"Oh c'mon, it couldn't have gone that badly. He –whoever he is –probably thinks you're cute and charming and he's totally in love with you just like every other guy you talk to. I think you may be overreacting a bit."

Rose picked up her book and began reading again, tearing into the licorice. Grace stared at her. How could she be relaxed at a time like this? Did she not understand the severity of the situation? What if Grace was losing her charm? What if she was so awkward around boys now that she ended up alone with ten cats, a goldfish and a pet turtle? What if –she couldn't even bear the thought, but it forged on anyway. What if she was turning into _Rose_?

Grace shuddered at the thought.

Not that there was anything wrong with her sister. There wasn't. Grace just liked actually socializing with people.

"You don't understand," Grace finally said.

Rose absentmindedly ate another bit of licorice and waved for her to continue.

Grace could hardly get the words out. "I –I," she gulped, and forced herself to say it. "I blushed." She said it as if it were the worst thing in the world. Which, to Grace, it was.

Rose froze. Slowly, she put down the book, and looked at her sister. Most people would laugh at the way Grace was handling the situation. "So she blushed, that's no big deal," they'd say. But when it came to Grace, it was possibly the biggest news since their dad told them they were moving.

See, Grace didn't blush. Ever.

She didn't get the nervous, stammering gene that Rose had. Grace was the strong, confident, I-don't-really-care-what-you-think person that hadn't blushed since they were five.

So ya, blushing may not be a major concern to normal people, but Grace was far from normal.

"You _what_?"

"Don't make me say it again!"

"But how did that even happen?"

"I don't know! One second I was looking at the candy, the next I was staring into these deep, beautiful brown eyes. But not like the dull, mud kind of brown. His were like melted dark chocolate, all liquid and hot and warming and delicious and – "

"Yes, ok, I get it. They were beautiful. Please continue."

Grace glared. "And I was so awkward. It was embarrassing. He must think me a complete idiot. I didn't even know a knut from a sickle!" She buried her face in her hands and groaned. "Also, which one is the gold one?"

"A galleon. There are seventeen sickles in a galleon and twenty-nine knuts in a sickle."

Grace stared at Rose. "Ok, well, whatever. We have more pressing matters. Like what the fuck is wrong with me."

Rose smirked a little. "It's obvious isn't it? You like him."

Grace was appalled. "Like him? I don't even know him! All I know is that his name is Dean, he looks like a god and is in a compartment a couple down from us with this sandy haired Irish kid. Plus, I don't do feelings."

Rose rolled her eyes. "Ya ok, whatever you say. Did you get anything chocolatey?"

Two more things hit her face.


	4. F O U R

| Rose |

The train rattled on and the compartment was once again filled with silence. Rose had stuffed a chocolate frog into Grace's mouth to stop her nervous ranting, and took the reprieve as a chance to think. It was very odd for Grace to be so out of sorts about a boy. From what she could gather, Grace had acted shy, small, and awkward –all things that defined Rose. And the boy probably still liked her. Grace was better at being Rose than Rose was. How great.

It could just be nervous jitters about being at a new place, but Rose doubted it. Grace didn't really get nervous about things; especially boys.

No, the only explanation was that Grace actually kind of liked him, which was weird in itself considering they talked for a solid three minutes. But people do fall in love in mysterious ways. Not that this was love. Or that either sister had been in love before. Rose, surprisingly, had come very close at their old school, but after the incident she knew her shot had gone haywire.

She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to block the images that barged their way into her head.

 _Stop thinking about it. You did what you had to._

Liquid, hot and heavy, rolled languidly down her hand from where her fingernails bit into her palm in crescent shaped marks. She studied the small indents for a little, fighting to gain control of her thoughts. Just thinking about it made her angry all over again.

Her eyes flicked up to Grace. Normally the sight of her sister would be reassuring, but instead of seeing her sitting in front of her, staring out the window deep in thought, she saw her lying there, hardly moving. Her eyes blank. Her skin clammy and grey. And she saw _him._ Standing there. Smiling like the sick, sadistic son of a –

"Rose? Rose, you ok?"

Grace's eyes were suddenly right in front of her, although Rose could have sworn she was still sitting right across from her a second before. Her eyes went to her hand and all of the blood that dripped from it. Rose slowly retracted one hand from the other, wincing internally as the nails pulled away and the ache started from the loss. She stared unfocusedly at the hardened crimson moon indents, then at the ones that were almost healed.

"You need to stop doing this to yourself," Grace murmured softly. "Hey, look at me." She took Rose's chin in between her thumb and index, forcing her to look into her eyes. "Everything is ok now. You have to let it go."

Rose shook herself out of her head in time to finally piece together what Grace was saying. She looked away as Grace riffled through the bag for a second, and came back with a roll of wet wipes and a piece of paper.

"Thanks," she said, a little wobbly and started wiping away the blood from her hands. Grace took a seat beside her. It was quiet between the two of them as she scrubbed. She hoped she hadn't caused Grace to think about what happened. That was the last thing she needed.

"What's that?" Rose asked, nodding her head to the paper still clasped between Grace's fingers as she performed a silent cleaning charm on her palms. That spell had come in handy very often lately.

Her sister looked much more comfortable with the change in topic. "It's the letter from Hogwarts with the course list and all of that shit. But more importantly, it's the little letter telling us to go to the prefect's compartment for information on how we're getting to school and what to do blah blah blah."

The information rang a dim bell. They each had gotten the same letter, although Rose had hardly looked at hers. "Isn't there only one way to get to school, and isn't it this train? What other way is there?"

Grace scanned the letter again, then shrugged her shoulders. "I don't know, but I guess we should head over there soonish."

Rose nodded and they both stood, heading to the door. She flexed her hands, trying to soothe the pain. She would have used a spell to get rid of it, but feeling the pain anchored her to reality, as masochistic as that was.

"Wait," Rose stopped in front of the opened door. "What are we supposed to do with all of our stuff?" They both surveyed their bags and various wrappers and books.

"Uh, we can just leave it?" Grace said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

Rose gave her a look. "What if someone steals it?"

Grace snorted at that. "Yes because people are really that interested in," she picked up the book Rose was reading, "'Kill the Boyband'. What the fuck kinda book is that?" she tossed it carelessly back onto the seat.

"Hey!" Rose hit her arm. "It's actually a really good book. They kidnapped one of the members of this band and I'm not that sure what they're going to do with him. They're kinda creepy if I'm being honest, but I have to put myself in their shoes and wonder what I'd do if –"

"As if you don't know what you'd do if your favourite band member was at your mercy." Grace's smirk said it all.

Rose blushed and swatted her sister again. " _Anyway,_ we have money and stuff in here too. I don't really want to lug around all of our shit though, but I also don't want anyone to come in and take it." She bit her lip and turned to Grace, who was shaking her head at her sister's unrequired worry.

"We could lock the doors?" Grace suggested with a roll of her eyes.

"Yes! Ok, let's do that."

They both cast the spell, retreating from the compartment. Rose looked to the left and the right as they stowed their wands in their boots.

"So, which way do you think the prefect's compartment is?"

"Uhhh..." Grace looked around before pulling Rose to the right. "Let's go this way."

"Would going this way have anything to do with a certain boy?"

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Well, I specifically remember during your bout of mild insanity that you said his compartment was just a couple down from ours."

"It's very possible I said that, yes."

"Ok so I guess we should –what the fuck are you doing?"

Grace paused mid crouch. "Uh... nothing?" The corridor was deserted of people, and Grace was rolling from compartment to compartment, crouching and peering through the glass before frowning and going on her way.

"This is a good way to make friends actually. As long as they don't think we're crazy or randomly re-enacting a James Bond movie."

"Please. Nobody could ever mistake us for Bond girls, we are not that pretty."

"Ok, whatever, just try not to crash into any–"

"Fuck!"

" –thing."

Rose collapsed on the floor, laughing too hard to be heard. Grace had rolled poorly and banged into the door of a compartment. Rubbing her head and scowling, she looked up through the glass, then leapt to her feet in alarm.

"Gottagogottagogottagogottago!" Grace yelped, diving into a random compartment a couple down.

Rose was confused. She was still trying to catch her breath from her laughing fit and the lack of oxygen made her brain a bit fuzzy. It was only when the compartment door opened that she realized what it was that could have made Grace run away like that.

"Oi, what the fuck?"

The smile melted right off Rose's face as she stared up into the face of a random boy.

She gulped, scrambling to her feet. "Oh, uh, hi there..."

The boy looked at her, a little humorously. "What were ya doin' on tha floor?"

Rose looked at her feet nervously. She doubted Grace wanted to be mentioned, considering she ran away and _left her here._ Like, what a great sister, thank you so much.

"I- I- slipped a little, and kinda hit your door. I'm so sorry about that by the way. I didn't mean to bother you and your," Rose peered inside, seeing the other boys staring, their game forgotten, "friends. I'll let you get back to your game, I'm so sorr –"

His booming laugh cut off the rest of her apology. He leaned casually against the door frame, arms crossed as he studied her. He was a lot cuter when he smiled, Rose noted. His hair was a little weird though.

"Not ta worry, there's no need ta apologize. Or be so nervous. We aren' gonna hurt ya or anything. I'm Seamus by tha way. I'll take a guess an say you're new here?"

Rose only nodded in response. She could feel all of the people in the compartment looking at her and it made her uncomfortable. She crossed her arms and looked to the right trying to spot the place that Grace disappeared. A face was pressed up against the glass, looking at her with wide eyes.

Grace waved frantically, pointing towards the compartment with the boys in it. Rose looked back to Seamus, only to see another boy had joined him.

"I told you I'd be seeing you around," the other boy said. He was actually very cute.

"Uh... sorry, what?" Rose was confused. She doubted she had ever seen this guy in her life. She looked back to Grace, only to see her face-palm. Sheesh, she knew she was awkward, but normally Grace encouraged her instead of made fun of her.

The boy looked at her weirdly. She looked at him weirdly. Seamus looked between the two of them curiously.

And then it clicked.

"Ohhh! You're trolley boy!"

"I suppose you could call me that. Or Dean works too. I never did catch your name by the way. Also, did you do something to your hair? I could have sworn it was a lot curlier."

Rose laughed a little awkwardly. Fuck Grace for putting her in this situation. "That would be because I'm not the same girl you met."

Dean's eyebrows flew up to his hairline, before understanding dawned on him. "You're her sister then? The one who liked licorice?"

"Yep, that would be me."

"Wow, you two look the exact same."

"It might be because we're twins, but you never know." She didn't mean to be so sarcastic, but they got this all the time and it was a little annoying. He laughed good naturedly though, so she guessed it was ok.

"So what's your name then?" Seamus asked.

"I'm Rose and my sister is Grace," she directed the last part to Dean. He nodded, looking very pleased. "Anyway, I should be off looking for her, we have to go to the prefect's compartment for something or the other. Do either of you know where that is by chance?"

They both shook their heads, but Seamus pointed over Rose's shoulder, saying, "Is that her?"

The three looked to where Grace was pushed up against the glass, with two familiar red-heads. She smiled big, waved and then disappeared from view.

Rose laughed at Grace, thinking that it definitely served her right for stranding her here. "That would be her yes. It was good meeting you two by the way." She smiled and walked towards the compartment where Grace was hiding.

After cussing out Grace, more awkward (for Rose, at least) flirting between Grace and Fred/George (they were so similar, she didn't feel the need to differentiate) and a small fire that singed the bottom of her hair, Rose was –to say the least –slightly pissed.

Fred and George were trying to impress Grace with their new collection of fireworks. There were only two of them, but apparently they each did different things when lit, though Rose wasn't paying any attention to what they were saying as it really didn't interest her.

She was still a little annoyed from her slight disagreement with her sister. Of course, she understood why Grace would run away; looking like an idiot in front of someone you liked was awful. But she could have used it as a means to talk to him! Instead, she just left Rose there to take the heat. And Grace knew how afraid Rose was of looking foolish in front of –well anyone really.

Rose didn't even know why she cared so much what others thought of her. But just thinking of someone –anyone –making fun of her, making her out to be less than who she was; it made her want to cry.

And she was so over crying.

Also, they had been in here for a solid hour, and she had hardly said a word since she and Grace spoke. She was getting really bored.

Which is naturally when things started to go wrong.

" –and we charmed it so it will stay active for hours. It has to burn out by itself: trying to vanish it or destroy it just makes it multiply. Which comes in handy, especially if you knew our mother." Fred grimaced a little, gesturing to the firework in his hand.

"Our mother would probably find it fascinating. She's very into all of that science-y stuff, which is why she's working in the Department of Mysteries at the Ministry here. Of course, it would have been nice if she had passed on some of her brain to me, but Rose got most of it," Grace laughed, nudging her sister.

Rose looked up at her name, smiled big, then went back to staring at her hands.

Grace coughed. "Well anyway, can I see it in action? I'd be willing to pay for it," she gave her best puppy dog face that Rose knew any male specimen was susceptible to.

One look at her face and George was already pulling out his wand to light the firework.

Rose didn't think that somebody who created such an extensive firework could be stupid enough to light it in such a small space.

She was wrong.

The firework burned to life, flashing beautiful colours so bright Rose had to close her eyes. It was a wonderful show behind her eyelids, and she almost calmed down enough to enjoy it, until she smelled the smoke.

The fireworks had burned the curtains on the windows; very close to where Rose sat. She could feel the heat rolling off the fire, could smell it on her hair. And then she didn't know which was hotter; the blaze or the anger she felt.

Grace was laughing coyly, as if they always almost died in minor explosions and it didn't matter her hair was smoking. Fred and George were frantically trying to stop it from spreading and their friend, Lee, was apologizing profusely to Rose, seeing as he was the only one who saw how angry she was.

Rose took a deep, calming breath, only to choke on the smoke coming from her own head. That pushed her a little bit too far.

In one swoop of her hand, wind exploded and put out the fire, sucking up the smoke and fireworks and pushing all of the occupants into their seats. With another flick, she fixed her hair, the deadened, burned pieces growing back swiftly into their curls. A snap of her fingers and the wind tunnel disappeared, leaving the compartment completely still. She stood up, swiping the dust from her jeans and met the incredulous stares head on.

"As fun as this has been, I think Grace and I should be going now. Would any of you happen to know where the prefect compartment is?"


	5. Chapter 5

| Rose | 

She could feel the holes burning the side of her head, even five minutes later.

The two of them hadn't said anything to each other after she had pulled Grace out of the compartment, smoking hair and all.

"Bloody hell, did you see her eyes –?"

"–Did she even use her wand –?"

"–All of our fireworks. Gone. We're going to have to start from –"

The slamming of the compartment doors behind them had cut off whatever Lee and the Weasley twins were saying. Rose rolled her eyes. What did they have to complain about? _Their_ hair hadn't gone up in flames.

She looked through someone's compartment window as they passed. The sun was starting to go down outside, shadows overlapping each other. The sunset was beautiful, especially with the barren landscape. Rose took a moment to appreciate it. She couldn't remember the last time she had witnessed a sunset. Or a sunrise, for that matter. It was just the beginning of one, where the oranges and yellows and reds all blurred; where the sun wasn't so powerful that you could actually make out its silhouette; where everything came together so perfectly, she couldn't help but feel right.

Rose looked at the fading sun and let it chase out the remaining darkness within her.

She felt calm, all the anger that had suddenly appeared in the compartment bubbled away. She couldn't help but feel that maybe (now that she wasn't in a red haze) she had gone a little overboard back there.

That actually seemed to happen a lot –her going a little crazy. She tried to think back to when it first happened, when she first noticed that her elastic band of emotions was tighter, when she first snapped. It couldn't have been but a few months ago, when she and Grace had turned fifteen. That's when everything started for her.

Someone cleared their throat. Rose looked up to find the eyes that had been staring at her since leaving the compartment. They both stopped in the middle of the corridor. There weren't many people around where they were; only a few midgets huddled together down the hallway and a couple making out.

Grace raised one eyebrow. Rose rolled her eyes. Grace narrowed hers. Rose crossed her arms. Grace looked on. Rose looked away.

"Ok fine! I'm sorry. I didn't mean to embarrass you back there. I didn't mean to ruin their work or, like, I don't know –"

"Freak out a little? Go crazy? Cause a huge wind storm and suck everything up in a matter of seconds just because your hair got singed a little bit?"

"That's not fair, you know I like my hair the way it is." Rose pouted. "And it got freaking burned off, not 'singed a little.'"

"Yes well, you overreacted."

Rose sighed. She hated fighting with her sister, so she conceded defeat instead. "Ok, so maybe I did a little. But it's not like they were doing anything useful! If I hadn't stepped in we all would have died."

Grace rolled her eyes with a grudging smile. "Whatever. But you need to apologize to them." She waved a stern finger at her sister. Rose sighed again, but nodded. "Good. For the record, I'm kinda glad you went psycho or else my hair would have ended up looking as ugly as yours."

"At least mines not smoking," Rose laughed, pulling out her wand to stop Grace's resemblance to a fire pit.

They were nearing the end of the train now. So far there had been no compartment marked 'Prefects' or whatever would be on it, only a bunch of nervous looking eleven year olds, some very severe looking people in green and a whole bunch of compartments laughing and making a lot of noise.

"We were never that short," Grace stated, pressing up against the wall of the corridor so a midget first year could run through.

"I think each generation is getting progressively smaller." Rose responded. "Except, I don't think we can say anything. It's a good thing our hair is so big. It definitely makes up for the inches we lack."

"And it's full of secrets." Grace wiggled her eyebrows jokingly, running past her sister. Rose couldn't help but think how right she was as she took off after her. They giggled and stumbled on until they finally found it. It was on their right, the blinds drawn so no one could see in. It was a bigger compartment than the rest on the train, and was indeed marked 'PREFECTS' with the Hogwarts crest stamped underneath.

The sisters looked at each other. "Should we knock or something?" asked Grace.

Rose shrugged and took the initiative. She stepped forward and knocked timidly three times, kind of hoping no one would answer so she wouldn't have to socialize with more people.

There was a shuffle on the other side, a mumbled voice, a thwack, a yelp, and then the door opened. Except, unlike the other compartments' doors that slid open, this one was like an actual door. An actual door that swung open. An actual door that swung open into the corridor and hit Rose.

She cursed loudly as she fell to the floor, clutching her throbbing cheek. Grace was already there, fussing over her, asking if she were ok and hauling her back to her feet. Rose had her eyes screwed up in pain as she grumbled and cursed out anything that came to her head.

"What the fuck kind of person designs a train where the doors open _into_ the fucking hallway that is the size of a fucking matchbox? People have to stand here! This is a fucking hazard. First my fucking head catches on fire now I get hit by a door? Fuck this fucking place..." and on and on it went. Grace frantically tried to calm down her sister and check her cheek but Rose had a hand firmly clamped to it and swatted away her hand whenever it came too close.

The calming effect the setting sun had had on her had long ago disappeared. Her frustration at – well everything, was coming back, and this was just the cherry on top. She was pretty sure there would be some kind of mark on her cheek, so that would be fun. And the person who opened the door was just _standing_ there. Did they not care that they had just hit someone?

Suddenly her anger was directed at that person, and she planned to give them one hell of a time. The black of her eyelids gave way to the bright fluorescent lights, much too bright at a time like this where her cheek was still humming in pain and she was fighting hard to keep control. She blinked –black light black light black – and then there was grey.

Grey.

And then that was all she could see.

The thrumming beat of her anger quickly steeled under the cold that hid beneath those eyes. Cold that seemed to sharpen the grey, turning it almost blue, imperceptibly so. Cold that froze the burning heat of both her pain and fury until there was nothing. Cold that tamed her.

"The meeting's almost over." And then there was a slam.

Rose shook herself mentally. Because what the fuck. "Well that was fucking rude," she managed to mumble before the pain came back full force. "Oww," she whined, rubbing her hand over the prominent bump on her cheekbone. That just made it hurt more.

"Let me look at it." Grace grabbed her head and tilted it so her neck hurt too. "Well... you've definitely looked better. And you've definitely looked worse. I think it'll bruise."

"Thanks for your medically-trained opinion," Rose sighed and looked around. People's eyes were trained on her, probably because of her screaming at the door. She gave them a withering glare –one of her least vicious ones –and they shrank away just like that. She smirked. "Does it make me look badass though?"

Grace laughed a little and studied her. "Maybe a little. But I think your attitude alone is good enough for that." Rose just stuck out her tongue.

The Prefects door opened again, though the twins had made sure to stand away from it this time, a hoard of people emerging. The guy who opened the door on her (pale, blond hair, tall and cold) knocked into her shoulder as he passed. Rose jostled into her sister. "Excuse you," she said. He merely glared at her, eyes flitting for a second over her bruising cheek before being on his way, tossing a clearly sarcastic "Welcome to Hogwarts" over his shoulder as he went.

"Dick," the girls muttered simultaneously, ducking into the compartment. A boy and a girl were still there, jotting things down in a book. Well, the girl was at least. The boy was making it snow with his wand, but ceased immediately when he saw the twins. He was attractive, floppy dirty blond hair, dimples and a wide smile that matched his shoulders. He nudged the girl (also blonde, but much paler) and smiled encouragingly.

"Hello there!"

"Hi," Grace drew the word out lightly, eyeing the boy with a smirk.

The girl closed the book roughly, the snap of it echoing in the compartment. She looked ferociously at Grace for a second before her features smoothed. "Can we help you?" she asked a little coldly. Grace looked a little alarmed by the hostility of this girl, but Rose understood almost right away. The boy seemed to be delighted by the girl's reaction to them, and looked at her with a goofy smile that made his dimples pop even more.

"I'm Ashton Irwin, Head Boy this year and this lovely lady is Bryana Holly, Head Girl," the boy said, brushing off some snow that still lay on his yellow tie and offering a hand to shake. Bryana looked at Ashton and rolled her eyes, a small pleased smile on her lips, though when her eyes darted back to the twins, they were still frosty.

Grace and Bryana held the stare for a second longer than normal, so Rose decided she had to intervene. "Rose Taylor," she shook his large hand and smiled shyly. "This is my sister, Grace," she nudged the girl beside her, who immediately stopped glaring and plastered a huge smile on her face.

Rose took Bryana's hand in hers, a small, apologetic smile on her lips. "Lovely to meet the both of you," Rose said, even though she could feel the dislike rolling off Bryana in huge waves. Their mother was always a stickler for politeness.

"Yes well, what can we do for you?" Bryana said, covering up her tone with her smile.

Grace produced the letter from the Headmaster and gave it to Ashton, flirty smile never leaving her face despite the dirty look she was receiving from the Head Girl. Bryana tore it from Ashton's hands and read through it quickly before shoving it back into his chest. He found this quite humorous.

"Basically, the only thing you need to decide on is if you want to go with the first years on the boats or on the carriages with the rest of the school. Then, you will go into the Great Hall and get sorted into your house," Bryana regarded them for a second, before adding rather rudely, "You do know the houses, don't you?"

"Of course we do. We aren't stupid," responded Grace in the same tone.

"Then you should know that I am in Ravenclaw," she gestured to the blue on her robes, "The House of the intelligent. I should hope to not see you there." There was a nasty smile on her face as Bryana and Grace had yet another stare down. Rose and Ashton made eye contact, both looking quite distressed at where the situation had gone.

"Ok, well I vote we go on the boat ride because those are always fun. Guess we'll see you guys later. Nice meeting you!" Rose hurriedly pulled Grace out of the compartment before the two girls could start throwing curses.

"The nerve of that girl!" Grace exploded as soon as they started towards their end of the train. "I never even did a thing to her and she was so rude! And what was with that, insinuating that we weren't smart enough to get into Ravenclaw. Fuck that bitch. I hope I get sorted into that house just to piss her off. I can't imagine what the other people in this school are like if _she's_ the best that they could come up with for Head Girl."

"Well," Rose started slowly, "you did somewhat provoke her..."

"What? I did no such thing! The only thing I said was hi! Does she not like that word?"

Rose rolled her eyes. "You're so dumb sometimes. You were totally trying to undress Ashton with your eyes."

Grace blinked. "Yes. So? He was hot."

Rose felt that her eyes would get permanently stuck with the amount of times she rolled them because of her sister. "Could you not tell there was something going on between the two of them? If they aren't together now, I say that they will be very soon. And to her, it seemed like you were trying to go for her man."

Grace looked at Rose for a second and thought back to Bryana and Ashton. "I can see it," she said thoughtfully. "And I guess I can't be too mad at her then because I would definitely do the same to any bitch that even looked at my guy."

Rose giggled. "You would do more than glare at them, that's for sure." Grace gave a wicked smile.

She looked into compartments as they passed, mostly because there wasn't much else to look at in a small hallway on a train. Many were filled with smaller kids, practicing their magic and playing exploding snap. Some were gorging themselves on candy, wrappers strewn all about the compartment. She momentarily thought of who had to clean such a huge train. That would probably suck.

One particular compartment caught her attention. There were around six people within, but no one was speaking. They all seemed very bored as they stared out the window. It puzzled her. You would think that after having gone a summer without seeing each other, they would all want to laugh and have fun, but no. They seemed on the verge of sleep.

Abruptly, one of them turned as the twins passed. Rose looked towards the sudden movement, and then wished she hadn't. Grey met green, for the second time that day. They both just stared at each other as the sisters walked by. At the last second Rose realized who it was she was staring at and hardened her gaze into a nasty glare, turning her head so she could no longer see him and giving him a great view of the bruise he put on her cheek. Asshole.

"I wonder what that green shit on the windows is," Grace said, pointing towards the weird goo stuff on the compartment window two down. They both slowed , looking curiously at the stuff as they neared. Whatever it was, it looked really gross.

"Is that Ginny and Hermione?" Grace asked, looking through the minimal clear bits on the window to see a bushy head and long, red hair. "We should go talk to them!" Grace exclaimed, always up for making friends.

Rose fretted. "Do we have to?" she whined. "I don't think they like me very much," she said, thinking back to Kings' Cross Station where they were all saying who knows what about her. 

"Oh shutup, you'll be fine," Grace scoffed and knocked on the door. "Just don't cause another wind tunnel."

The door slid open, an awkward, buck-toothed boy behind it. " –you just have to use the spell scourgify and it will all come off," Ginny was saying, siphoning the green stuff off of the windows. Looking around the compartment, everybody was covered in the slime, though none of them looked as displeased as the black haired bespectacled boy, struggling to hold onto a toad.

"What in the world happened here?" Rose couldn't help but ask. She was much too curious to think of the fact that she didn't know more than half of these people.

"Oh hey guys!" Ginny said, smiling in welcome. "Neville was just showing us the defensive mechanism his new plant has, and it got a little, er, messy." The boy who opened the door for them looked a little sheepish as he sat down, cradling a plant in his arms.

Rose aided Ginny in cleaning the compartment, and it was un-slimed in a matter of seconds. Ginny nodded in thanks, offering the twins seats beside her. Grace sat immediately beside her, smiling at Hermione. Rose turned to close the door behind them before taking her own seat beside her sister, but a sharp gasp made her pause.

"What happened to your cheek?" Ginny exclaimed, staring at the very significant bruise on Rose's cheekbone.

Rose's expression darkened immediately. Her intensely deep green eyes glittered dangerously at the thought of that pale-assed bastard and the shadow of the bruise across her cheek seemed to grow more prominent. The three boys in the compartment all shared looks, as this was the first time they'd ever seen her. And she was positively frightening.

"It looks as though perhaps the wrackspurts have gotten to you," a dreamy voice piped up. Rose immediately looked at the small blonde girl who spoke. She looked rather odd, with a weird pair of glasses on her eyes, wand behind her ear and an upside down magazine. She was so strange in fact that Rose had to focus on her for a couple of seconds, long enough to calm down and her eyes to lose that slight dangerous edge.

"Some dumbass hit her with a door," stated Grace with a glare when she realized Rose wasn't saying anything.

"So it was you who was yelling outside the compartment then. You have a good pair of lungs on you," whistled a tall red-haired boy, Prefect's badge glinting in the light. His hair was the same shade as Ginny's, so Rose could only assume that this was yet another brother of hers. In fact, looking at him and the raven-haired boy next to him, she realized that they were the two from the platform; the ones who ran into the wall.

"We thought you two died," Rose blurted out at the same time the dark-haired boy said, "Who did it?"

She could feel the entire compartment looking at her in confusion and had to resist the urge to face palm. Her face burned as she tried to explain, with no help whatsoever from a laughing Grace. "At the platform. We saw the two of you, uh, running straight for the, um, wall, and I thought you were going to die." They were still staring at her. "You didn't though! So that's a good thing." She laughed awkwardly to herself and hoped that someone would do something so she wouldn't have to go find her own wall to crash into.

"Okay," the boy said, drawing out the word and looking at her weirdly. "So who hit you with the door?"

"Oh," interjected Hermione, "it was –"

"Malfoy," the dark-haired boy hissed, glaring at something over Rose's shoulder. The compartment door slid open once again, and in the doorway stood a very familiar little bitch.

"Potter," the boy sneered, looking around.

"Oh please," Rose groaned in both annoyance and anger. "Are you following me?"

"Please," he scoffed, looking rather put out at the question, "Who even are you?"

"What do you want Malfoy?" Potter stood up. They were about the same height, though Rose couldn't tell whose hair was higher; Malfoy's with all of his gel or Potter's with his untidy bed-head look.

"Manners, Potter. Wouldn't want to get a detention, would we?" smirked Malfoy. The two apes beside him laughed loudly. She didn't understand how they could all fit in this tiny compartment, especially with the size of Malfoy's sidekicks.

"Oh, fuck off would you?" Grace said from beside her, clearly fed up with all of the anger today had produced. "But before you leave, is there anything you'd like to say to my sister here?"

Malfoy studied the two of them for a second. Rose had no doubt something sarcastic would come out of his mouth in two seconds, but pushed her head up a bit higher, showcasing her bruise.

"I already said welcome, didn't I? But it seems you do have something on your face. Right here," he pointed to his own cheekbone, smiling maliciously. "Might want to look out for oncoming doors in your future."

"You slimy son of a –" Rose had to be held down by both Grace and Ginny to avoid returning the favour to Malfoy. The air around them grew electric with the storm in her eyes. Malfoy cowered, staring into them.

"You best be watching yourselves. I'll be _dogging_ your footsteps if you step out of line," he stared pointedly at Potter, smirking with his final words and retreating from the compartment.

Rose stopped struggling, heaving in her spot, trying to calm down. Everybody was silent, trying to gauge the reactions of both Rose and Potter. Finally, after a couple of deep breaths, Rose started laughing. She made the mistake of making eye contact with Grace, and then the two were in a fit of hysterics. The others in the compartment looked at the two of them oddly, but slowly joined in on their laughter. Soon, the room was filled with the rambunctious sound of giggles and laughing.

Rose stopped abruptly, a scowl lacing her face. "So who the fuck was that and is he always such a dick?"

"That," said Potter, sitting back down and sharing a look with Hermione, "was Draco Malfoy. The world's biggest prat."

"And his two goons, Crabbe and Goyle," added Ginny's brother.

"More like ugly and smelly," muttered Grace. Rose snorted. How true.

"Sorry to be rude, but we never got your names either. I'm Grace," she said, smiling nicely, "and this is my sister Rose."

Rose waved awkwardly and looked down, suddenly shy. These were the people who were talking about her on the platform, she didn't really know how to act around them.

"Right, er, that's Neville," Potter pointed to the boy with the plant, who gestured with it in greeting. "This is Ron," he clapped the shoulder of the red-headed boy who nodded, "and I'm Harry. Harry Potter." He looked as though he was waiting for some kind of impending doom.

"And that's Luna," Ginny added, gesturing to the blonde girl who kept reading her magazine.

"Nice to meet you all," Grace said. Rose smiled and nodded in agreement, looking at her fingernails. The toad that Harry had grasped in his hands when they first came in was hopping around their feet. There were a few owls overhead that hooted in their cages. Night had fallen finally, the moon hanging low in the sky. It shone dimly over the train, and with the glare of the lights from the compartment, Rose had to squint to see the trees outside. She wondered how much longer they had to go until they arrived, as she was very hungry. Those liquorice wands had not assuaged her for very long.

Grace was talking when Rose tuned back in. "–you know when we'll be arriving? I'm starving!"

"We're almost there. Normally we arrive around eight, and it is about... quarter after seven," said Hermione. Harry and Ron were mumbling to each other about something. Harry messed up the back of his head and pushed around his fringe, revealing something on his forehead.

"Dude!" Grace exclaimed, pointing to his head. "That's such a cool mark! Is it a scar? Or a birthmark? We have birthmarks on our hips; mine kind of looks like an eye if you look at it right and hers –"

"Mine kind of looks like a spark. Or a flower. We haven't really decided yet," piped up Rose in a small voice. She looked up from her hands to see that everyone was staring at them. The compartment was completely silent. The sisters looked at each other in confusion.

"He's... he's Harry Potter," Ron said slowly, looking at the twins like he just saw a three headed dog.

"Ya... we got that from the introduction and everything." Rose was bewildered. Why did that matter at this moment?

"Why are they looking at us like that?" whispered Grace.

"I don't know, what did we say?" Their whispers carried in the tense silence.

Harry cleared his throat. "You guys, you don't know. Do you."

"Uh... know what?"


	6. S I X

|Grace|

"So let me get this straight." Grace looked at Harry blankly, trying to process everything. "This fucking tyrant, Voldemort, wanted to rule the wizarding world because he was a psycho and felt he was better than everyone. So he gathered a bunch of other fucked-up people and called them Death Eaters and branded them like slaves and made them do horrible, horrible things.

"Then, for no fucking reason at all –probably because he was a little bitch –he went after your family and murdered them, but was unable to kill you and instead killed himself." Grace took a breath. Rose muttered a sarcastic "how unfortunate" to her hands, having glued her eyes to them since Harry had started talking almost half an hour ago.

"And now he's back," Grace said quietly.

The compartment was thrown into silence again. Hermione and Ron were looking to Harry nervously, to see how he was after revealing all of this information; Neville looked very frightened at the topic at hand and gripped his plant more securely; Ginny looked calm considering what they were discussing; and Luna had paid them no mind, instead continuing to read her magazine (though she had turned it right side up). Harry stared at the twins in turn, boring his eyes into Grace's then flicking to Rose's hands and back again.

Grace found Rose's eyes for a second before they went back to her hands. She could tell exactly what was going through her sister's head, as it was the same as her own. She reached out to Harry's right hand that was balled into a fist, and squeezed it.

"We are so, very, _truly,_ sorry for what you've had to go through, Harry." Grace locked eyes with his, trying her best to portray how awfully she felt about his situation. Harry nodded stiffly, clearing his throat and looking out the window. Nobody really knew where to go from there. The air was a bit tense; there was room for more discussion but there was also space to move on.

Grace was still trying to wrap her head around everything. She couldn't even imagine how Harry dealt with all that had happened to him over the years. Hell, she was hardly able to deal with what had happened to her –and that was nothing compared to what he'd been through. She shuddered at the thought.

Her memories were very hazy from that night. There were flashes every once and a while, and sometimes she'd even re-experience it in her dreams, but when she woke up screaming, she could never remember exactly what happened; only a lingering feeling of disgust that three showers finally abated.

One memory, however, was crystal clear; one that she wished she could burn.

His face was there, right in front of her, smiling. She recalled, with distinct clarity, how blue his eyes were in the moonlight; how deep they seemed to be, as if she could see into him; how she could have drowned in them, and she would not have minded one bit.

And then she was.

She was drowning and everything was blurry and black and dark and she wished she could go back to blue and she _really did mind._ The last sharp image she had before everything went fuzzy was the transformation of his smile: from perfect and model-worthy to malicious and sinister.

Then there was only red and pain.

Grace shook herself out of that time. She was normally very good at controlling her thoughts, as was her sister, but once and a while they plunged ahead of her. Her hand was twisting a piece of hair absently –typically a dead giveaway she was overthinking something. Grace quickly ceased, pulling apart the knot she had just created. Thankfully Rose was in her own world; she would guess right away where her thoughts had drifted if she were paying close enough attention and that would not do –Rose was even more affected by that night than Grace. She needed a distraction.

"What kind of name is Voldemort anyway?" Grace took note of Neville's tiny yelp and wondered just how horrible this thing (she could hardly call him a man as what he did was completely inhumane) was if people were terrified of only hearing his name.

"It's French." A small voice said from beside her. Rose had finally joined the conversation. Her voice was choked, probably from lack of use, but also emotion. Rose normally got overwhelmed by emotional things. If one person was crying, she was crying too. She sometimes experienced someone's sentiments more than they themselves. Especially when she cared for them.

"It means, loosely, 'fly from death'. You should know that," Rose nudged Grace's side. "But I guess you never were that good at French," she teased, cracking a smile.

"There are too many verbs and tenses and different ways to say the same thing and it's just too confusing," grumbled Grace, crossing her arms and pouting.

Rose laughed. "That, and you were too busy staring at the back of Kyle's head to pay any attention." Grace slapped her sister's arm, laughing and nodding in agreement.

"When did you learn French? I know a bit, but only because my parents and I vacation in France fairly often," Hermione asked. The others slowly relaxed in their seats, the tense air dissolving around them with the change of subject.

"Before we turned eleven, we went to a no-maj school where we were in French immersion. Our parents didn't want us to miss out on our nation's second language," Grace rolled her eyes.

"I thought that's what you said!" Hermione exclaimed. "At the station, you said something that sounded like "no-maj" and I didn't quite know what that was, though I reckoned it was because of your accent. But you said it again there."

"A no-maj is someone who doesn't have magic –no magic, no-maj," explained Grace.

"Isn't it muggle here? Our dad used to call them that until he got used to the North American way of saying things. Our parents still fight over the proper way to say certain words –it's highly entertaining," Rose said with a laugh.

"Yes it is, but it's fascinating to learn about other wizarding countries. Where in North America are you two from? I figured you weren't from Europe because your accents don't quite fit, but I couldn't put my finger on any certain place." Hermione leaned forward toward the twins eagerly, hands clasped together on her legs, bouncing excitedly.

Grace straightened up in her seat and cracked her back. "We're from Canada –Ontario to be specific. Our dad left England because of something or the other when he was twenty-one. Nobody tried to stop him; he didn't get along very well with his parents. He met our mum a year after his move and they fell in love and blah blah blah. It's a very sweet story when you haven't heard it ten million times."

"So what school did you go to? What was it like? What spells did you learn? Is there any difference between the curriculum here and –"

"Hang on a second, I've just thought of something: do you think he left England because of Voldemort?" Grace interrupted. It had just popped into her head. There must have been a reason he left his home –the only home he'd known. She'd always thought it was because there was tension between him and his parents, but perhaps there was more to it.

Harry, who had tuned out during most of their conversation, suddenly looked interested. "I reckon that could be it," he said.

"He never does talk very much about England. And when he does, it's about Hogwarts. Except, you'd think he'd mention something about an evil dickwad of a wizard, wouldn't you?"

"Why would dad want to talk about something like that?" asked Rose. "It was probably absolute hell to go through. Who wants to relive hell by talking about it?" something about the look on Rose's face made Grace know exactly to what she was referring. She tried to take one of her sister's hands in her own, but Rose ripped it away and shrank into herself.

"You'd think there would be some mention of Voldemort in your classes. He couldn't have just affected Europe," said Harry.

"There was," Rose whispered, suddenly sitting up in her seat and looking straight at Harry. "There was. It was very small, but it was mentioned. We did a unit in our history class on wars and we briefly touched on this one that involved someone called 'He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.' We were only in our second year then, and history class was so boring we would mostly just rate the boys in our class, but from what I remember, it fits. The timing, the place, the name. I think I saw that name on the newspaper a couple weeks ago." Rose looked nervous. "Was that him?"

The compartment nodded as a unit.

"So glad we paid attention in that class," remarked Grace sarcastically.

"What I don't understand," started Hermione hesitantly, "is why you moved back here. If your dad tried so hard to run away, why would he come back just when things are starting up again?"

Grace glanced nervously at Rose, who had abruptly gone eerily still. A shadow passed over her face and she seemed to be in a mix of pain, anger and sorrow. Her hands were clenched and shaking. The compartment seemed to have been sucked of air. They had crossed some invisible line, but no one could tell why.

Grace cleared her throat. "W-well, our dad got a job offer here from the Ministry in the Office for the Detection and Confiscation of Counterfeit Defensive Spells and Protective Objects. After talking it over with our mum, he took it and we moved here over the summer." She smiled in hopes of deterring them from her shaky voice. She didn't think it worked.

"That's head of my dad's office! Guess our dads work together then huh?" Ron was oblivious to everyone else's apprehensive stares. She saw a look being shared between Harry and Hermione, and tried to quickly think of something else to say so as to not be interrogated.

She was saved by the whistle.

The high-pitched sound made Rose jump in her seat, shaking her head out of wherever it had been –though Grace could very well guess.

"That was the warning whistle," Hermione said slowly, looking warily at the twins. "You best be changing into your robes."

"Right, well it was great meeting you guys," Grace nodded to the boys, pulling Rose by her sleeve. "I hope to be seeing you around!" she added, scurrying out of the compartment and fast-walking to their own.

For all the trouble it caused, especially with that awful Head Girl, she thought the boat ride would be much grander.

They were, obviously, the only two older people in a sea of first years. When the woman calling for all first years saw them, she questioned their presence, but as soon as the word 'transfers' was uttered, she ushered them along.

They shared a boat with two smaller, trembling boys, though they let them go in front. The night was bright with stars and a waning moon, reflecting off the still lake like a perfect postcard. Grace could make out, far to the right, the rest of the school going in and out of carriages that seemed to pull themselves. She wondered how long they would have to wait for the boats to start moving, when they suddenly moved by themselves.

The older witch was in a boat by herself, leading the procession. Most of the first years gasped with the sudden jerk of the vessel, but Grace and Rose were used to magic and didn't even blink.

A castle –Hogwarts presumably –loomed in the distance, lights coming from within that blocked out some of the stars. The moment was breathtaking: picture perfect. But that was it. The other first years, and even Rose, were still in awe of the impressive fortress, and were whispering excitedly to one another. To Grace however, it seemed like a copy of their old school, and didn't think it all that spectacular.

Of course, it was beautiful, but the beauty seemed to get old rather quickly.

Or maybe that was just her hunger talking. She was positively famished and only thought of food. Everything else was lost on her.

They finally made their way through the lake (a huge tentacle waved at them from the distance. "That's the giant squid," Rose whispered to Grace. She was the one to read Hogwarts: A History), up the stairs and through a giant door into a huge corridor where a stern witch in emerald robes was waiting for them.

"Thank you, Professor Grubbly-Plank," said the witch, regarding them with a calculating look. The other first years gawked at the expansive hall they were in, but stilled with one glance from her.

She introduced herself as Deputy Headmistress, Professor McGonagall. The rest of her speech didn't register as Grace was much too hungry to focus and wondered if they had any ice cream.

Rose pulled her to the back of the group after Professor McGonagall had left, saying she'd be back in a couple of minutes.

"What if we get separated?" whispered Rose urgently. She looked very perturbed at the thought. Grace had not thought about it, though she didn't seem nearly as bothered by the idea as her sister. She loved her sister very much, so much in fact, that she thought separating might be good for her. Rose relied heavily on her, and though Grace relied on Rose, she was much more independent. Rose needed more friends, and more people to lean on as Grace couldn't always be there for her. It wasn't healthy.

But then again, what would she do without her sister? They'd been together through everything; they always had each other's backs; to put it simply: they were best friends. That could all change.

She didn't know what to think.

"We'll cross that bridge if we come to it," Grace quoted their mother's no-maj saying and patted Rose's arm comfortingly.

"But what if that bridge is really close and basically demolished and there's no safe way across?"

"Then we build one, silly. We're witches: we can do anything."

"Ahem." Professor McGonagall cleared her throat. All eyes – nervous, frantic, calm and scared, made their way to her. "We're ready for you now."

Grace could feel the anxiety emitting from her sister as they walked through the huge double oak doors of the Great Hall, though she herself had no nerves. What was the point of being nervous? Whatever happens, happens.

She linked their pinkies –something they did when they went out and about when they were younger and didn't want to lose each other –feeling the rest of the schools stares on them and knowing that they would get to her sister more so than herself. She didn't mind the attention, and took the opportunity to look fearlessly at some of the boys in the rows of tables. There were a _lot_ of cute boys here. Smirking and winking away, this was already better than their old school.

Grace saw Fred and George along with all of the other people from the compartment at a table closest to the wall. She waved at them. They smiled and waved back, but gave Rose a sour look when she glanced over (and sheepishly looked away). The Hall was pretty much silent apart from all of their footsteps, so it wasn't that hard to hear one of the Weasley twins saying something about how her sister seems to be "the Slytherin sort". Whatever that meant. Though it did make Harry, Ron and Hermione look at them more attentively.

She felt Rose stiffen, her head tilted to the left. When Grace looked over to see what it was, she caught sight of very pale blond hair. She squeezed her pinky just a little to get her attention off of Malfoy. Then they stopped.

They stood in front of a stool with an old, black, typical no-maj witch's hat on it. Behind the stool was a huge table with what must be all of the teachers. They looked at the hat intently, so Grace did the same.

Suddenly, the hat came to life and started singing. It was rather alarming; so much so that the twins took a step back as the hat kept singing about danger and house unity. It was a rather long song, so Grace –with her short attention span –took the time to look around. The Great Hall was, in fact, great. It was huge, with four tables all presumably for each house. There were doors that lead to who knows where along the walls, and, looking up, the ceiling was breathtaking.

"It's magicked to show the sky outside," whispered Rose when she saw her sister staring up at the ceiling like an idiot. There was a vast amount of candles that covered the circumference of the room, though Grace saw that only one was not lit. She thought she remembered reading somewhere (probably Hogwarts: A History when she first decided she was going to read it, then stopped about four pages in) that each candle represented a student at the school. Could that unlit candle mean –?

"When I call your name, you will put on the hat and sit on the stool. As we have transfers this year, we will start with them," Professor McGonagall said.

The twins looked at each other. This was it. The moment of truth.

"Taylor, Gracelyn." Grace cringed at the use of her full name. She squeezed Rose's hand one last time, then walked to the stool. She felt like she was walking to her death. The nerves weren't there before, but as she put the hat over her head, the material covering her ears so all she could hear was the sound of her own breathing, and falling over her eyes so the last thing she saw before dark was her sisters nervous face, she could feel them clawing at her stomach. It was not a good feeling.

And then there wasn't just her breaths. There was a voice. In her ear. "Hmm, a good mind, very good. Adventurous but level-headed. Know what you want. Clever, yes, but unbothered by grades. Not Ravenclaw then." Grace was disappointed for a second, as she did kind of want to show up that Head Girl, but was ultimately happy with not having to deal with her.

"Brave, very brave, especially as of late. Strong-minded, reliable, fearless. Hufflepuff is not the right spot for you, you would not go far." That made her happy. What kind of name was Hufflepuff? She definitely did not want to be there.

"Very ambitious, a thirst for the best. I know where you'll go. Welcome to the proud house of SLYTHERIN!"

The hat shouted out the last word and the table at the other end of the room exploded into applause. Grace took off the hat and looked to her sister who was clapping. She was a little sad to not be in the same house as the Weasley's and co, but they could all still be friends, right? Looking at them, she was surprised to see a look of disgust being directed at her. She was a little confused. What was so wrong with Slytherin? Turning to the table beckoning her, it was her turn to be disgusted. It was the table that that Malfoy boy was at.

Oh no, she thought, slowly making her way over, what kind of house has the likes of _him_ in it? I'm doomed.

She took a seat next to a boy with green hair, who smiled and welcomed her. She smiled back but anxiously looked up as her sister's name was called out.

"Taylor, Roslyn."

Rose took an obvious breath and marched up to the stool, locking eyes with Grace before being swallowed up by the hat. Grace noticed that they both fiddled nervously with the ends of their robes. She glanced around the room, not really knowing what to do with the time she had whilst awaiting their fate.

Dean, as Rose had told her, was sitting beside that Irish guy at the Gryffindor table. He must have felt her gaze because after a couple of seconds he made eye contact with her. Though there were two tables between them and perhaps hundreds of students in the way, for one moment she could imagine just him. Grace smiled, bright and happy at him, and in return received a weak, half-assed (in her opinion at least) grimace at best before he looked away, whispering to his friend who in turn looked her over.

She frowned, a little put out by that. Grace just did not understand. Was she not nice to him? And the Weasley's? She had been sorted, but what does that even mean anyway? Were they really only going to be friends with their own house? That didn't seem right. The sorting hat's song echoed in her head (at least the bits and pieces that she heard.) Was house unity not a thing that anyone else wanted?

Grace noticed Harry looking at her, so she waved at him. He looked rather confused, and waved back hesitantly. She wondered why they were suddenly treating her like that. She didn't think she'd done anything wrong.

A few moments later, the hat finally made its decision. One that made her heart sink.

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

Well fuck.


	7. Chapter 7

|Rose|

" _Loyal and protective. Fiery temper. A vast, complicated mind. Brave, but not quite independent yet. There is no ambition in you, only a thirst to stay hidden. Slytherin is not right for you. Family means everything, and you would do anything to for those you love. Selfish, but in the end you do what is right. There is only one house for you –HUFFLEPUFF."_

The sorting hat's voice swam in her head that night as she lay in bed. The other girls in her dorm had given up on trying to get her to talk after she had ignored them for the tenth time and let her stumble her way to her new four-poster bed in the corner, drawing the curtains.

She'd hardly noticed dinner, or the walk to the common room, or even getting into bed. It was all a blur. Somebody could have danced naked in front of her and she would not have even blinked. The only thing she could focus on was that she was not in the same house as her sister.

She was numb throughout the feast. She hardly ate, though her stomach was severely protesting that choice. She did not pay attention when people were talking to or around her. She did not notice when the Headmaster started his speech, and she did not notice when a professor interrupted him. Only when a girl with vivid red hair tapped on her shoulder to let her know dinner was over did she clue back in.

Rose stood up awkwardly and climbed over the bench, instantly getting swallowed up by the crowds of people making their way out of the Great Hall. She craned her neck trying to get a glimpse of Grace so that they could discuss this travesty, but her sister's hair was nowhere to be seen. Slumping over in defeat, she followed the red-haired girl and her friends to her new home.

Her excitement at being in a new school had taken a very high dive off a cliff and tumbled into a nervous terror. How was she going to survive without her sister? Her best friend?

Rose had been looking forward to coming here all summer –it was the only thought that kept her sane when she was in that place; that and her sister was safe. She had wanted to put everything behind her and move forward: forget the past and live for the future. But she had not been expecting this at all. She almost wished to be back at her old school, just so that she had her sister with her again.

This was the first time they'd been separated since –well ever. _Except when you were in that place._

She shivered at that thought. Rose always tried to block those memories and pretend like that had never happened. Those were definitely the worst months of her life.

She changed into her pj's and climbed into bed in a daze. Through the thin material of the curtains, she could hear the whispers and laughter of her new roommates as they caught up with one another and talked about their summers. Harry's name was mentioned quite a few times, and Dumbledore's, along with You-Know-Who's. From what she could gather, the Ministry of Magic over here was acting like that guy wasn't back, and discredited both Harry and Professor Dumbledore. That would have, normally, intrigued her, but she could not muster the energy to care about much at the moment.

She cast a silencing charm on her bed, and everything was finally quiet. That was both a relief and a nightmare. Now, all she had were her thoughts.

Rose curled up in a ball, hugging herself and stared a hole into her curtains. Homesickness rooted itself in her belly. Everything had changed within a twelve-hour period, and she wanted it all to go back. Back to her mum's cooking and smile and smart-talk. Back to her dad's hugs and stupid jokes and comfort. Back to sharing a room with her sister and late night talks with junk food and movie watching and _she just wanted back._

Sighing, she rolled over onto her stomach and buried her head in the pillows. She could feel the hot sting of tears, and unlike at dinner when they were swiftly held back, she let them stain her new pillowcase.

It was going to be a long night.

Lost.

Lost was how she felt getting up in the morning to strangers. Getting dressed in her new robes (the tie had magicked itself yellow and black. She glared at it). Passing portraits on her walk down to breakfast who greeted her merrily as though this wasn't the end of the world (though that could have also been because she actually was lost).

She sat down at the Hufflepuff table, putting some toast on a plate and started picking at it. Though her stomach was growling, she felt nauseous and the thought of actually eating made it worse. This could have something to do with it being the first day of classes, or the fact that Rose was just never hungry in the morning.

Giving up on her toast, she picked up a yogurt and started to eat that instead. It was still pretty early and the Great Hall was not very populated. Grace was not yet seated at the Slytherin table, but that was to be expected; she tried to sleep in as late as possible. At this rate though, she wouldn't see Grace at all this morning.

"Hi, Roslyn right?" the red-haired girl from the night before asked timidly, taking a seat across from her. She looked nervous to be talking to her, either because Rose had ignored her the night before or because she was scowling fiercely at her yogurt.

Rose rearranged her face into a small smile and nodded. "I prefer Rose, actually."

"I'm Susan," she said, piling eggs and bacon onto her plate.

Rose nodded again, and then they were thrown into an awkward silence. By the time she finished her yogurt, the Great Hall was almost full and they still hadn't said much to one another other than a few comments on the weather and why anyone would choose chocolate yogurt over chocolate pudding. (She wasn't quite sure how that came about considering there was a severe lack of both food items, but she tried to roll with it.)

Still no Grace though.

Her other roommates showed up, looking just as tired as Rose felt and sat down beside Susan, though one had taken a spot beside Rose. Susan looked relieved to not have to awkwardly make small talk with Rose and immediately started a conversation with her friends. The girl beside her smiled in welcome and dug into her food.

"I'm Madeleine by the way," the girl said through some toast, pushing a strand of brown hair behind her ear. Rose looked at her in slight disgust, but laughed a little and introduced herself.

"Well it's nice to meet you Rose. We hope you enjoy it here in Hufflepuff –and between me and you," her voice dropped to a whisper, "as cheesy as it sounds, Hufflepuff is like a huge family, we're not going to bite you or anything. I get that you're quiet and shy because I was exactly like that when I was younger, and I'm not trying to pressure you into changing the way you are considering we just met and all because that would be weird and kind of creepy and –anyway, basically my point is, you have nothing to be afraid of here. Just try to relax a little ok? We're too young to get stress lines." Madeleine leaned back and saluted her with her piece of toast before unceremoniously taking another huge bite.

Rose slouched in her seat. Normally if anyone tried to tell her to relax like that she'd have already jumped down their throats, but with Madeleine it was different. The girl seemed as though she was just honestly trying to be nice. And helpful. Though, she spoke as though she knew how Rose was feeling, which, was a bit weird, maybe. They did just meet after all.

But she was right wasn't she? Rose didn't have her sister anymore. Or at least, she didn't have her as much. Which meant she'd be alone a lot.

Unless...

Unless she made some friends.

Which, she really, really sucked at.

And after last night's first impressions with her roommates, would they even want to be her friend? Fuck.

She cleared her throat awkwardly and looked to her roommates. They immediately quieted.

"I... I just wanted to say sorry for the way I was acting last night. I'm just a little upset and I did appreciate you guys trying to include me in your conversations at dinner. I swear I was not intentionally trying to be rude. So ya. Sorry," she finished lamely and fiddled with the spoon in her hand.

Madeleine shrugged. "No worries. We understood and didn't take it personally. Trust me though, honestly, Hufflepuff is a great house, although the name is a little off," she grinned. Rose smiled back and took a sip of her tea, feeling a bit better.

"Oh, here come the schedules. Please tell me we have Binns again in the morning, I would love to catch up on my sleep," Hannah said from beside Susan as Professor Sprout handed out their timetables.

Classes! She's bound to have some classes with her sister! Rose eagerly took the paper from her head of house and studied it. Double Charms, Double Potions, History of Magic and Care of Magical Creatures was what she had as her first day. She wondered what Grace's schedule was like and looked around, again, for her twin but, again, she was nowhere to be seen. Grace never remembered to set an alarm, and more likely than not slept in until mid-morning at the earliest. Rose hoped that one of her sister's new roommates would be kind enough to wake her up in time, since she herself would no longer be able to do so. She sighed at that thought.

Professor Sprout hovered after handing Rose her timetable and looked over the group, eyes landing on Madeleine. "Ms. Whitely, if you could be ever so kind as to show Ms. Taylor to her classes for the remainder of the week, it would be greatly appreciated. I will write you a note to give to your professors if you should find yourself late to any of your own classes." She quickly jotted down something on a piece of paper, handed it to Madeleine and bid them a good day.

"You don't have to do that, Madeleine, really," Rose muttered, looking down at her plate full of toast. She hated feeling like she was a burden to others, and she really didn't want Madeleine to feel like she had to do anything for her just because she was new.

Madeleine gave her a look like she was crazy. "Please, it's no big deal. I wish I had a guide when I was in first year, the amount of times I've gotten lost in this place! It's huge, and has a mind of its own; I swear some days there's a corridor going right and the next day it's switched and goes left. This school actually makes no sense."

"Honestly," Susan agreed, looking up from her timetable.

"This is so unfair!" cried Hannah with a pout and a head bang on the table. "All I want is a decent sleep and they give me potions first thing on Monday morning and history of magic last period? I'm going to fall asleep with my head in a cauldron and Snape is going to let me drown."

"Maybe it'll force you to actually pay attention in potions and you'll be able to scrape an acceptable in the OWL's," Susan said helpfully, stroking Hannah's hair soothingly.

"That'll never happen. I hope I do drown. Then at least I'll be at peace."

Rose watched the old friends interact and sipped thoughtfully at her tea. Could she ever be a part of their friendship like that? Where she wouldn't have to overthink everything she wanted to say just in case it sounded stupid or didn't make any sense because they were so used to her and liked her contributions? Where she could laugh freely and eat freely and not have to worry that they'll think her voice is too high-pitched or that she didn't have any manners?

She'd had a couple of friends at their old school, but no one she was as close with as Grace. She'd only ever been completely herself; one hundred percent comfortable around her family. With anyone else, it all felt forced and awkward.

"We should get going soon, Rose, especially if we want decent seats; Flitwick doesn't like the kids who sit at the back and makes the kids who sit in the front answer his questions," Madeleine stuffed the rest of her toast in her mouth, waved goodbye to Hannah and Susan and a couple of other Hufflepuff boys and started making her way towards the doors where she paused and spun around quickly. "Let me know how the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher is, Hans, I have her tomorrow and I want to be prepared."

And with one last forlorn glance at the Slytherin table, Rose set off after Madeleine, preparing for a long day ahead.

The classroom was cold and unwelcoming, like any other room in the dungeons. There was a draft coming from somewhere, Rose shivered from her spot against the wall and basked in shadows; which wasn't all that difficult, as the room seemed to be just one long shadow.

Maddie –as she had admitted she liked better because her mother always called her Madeleine when she was in trouble –had chatted the entire way from Charms to Potions and made Rose feel the most comfortable she'd felt since stepping foot in Hogwarts. However her next class was on the completely other side of the castle and quickly left Rose with a warning about Professor Snape and a good luck.

Stepping into the gloom that was the air of the Potions classroom, she found she was one of the only people there. Rose didn't quite know how to proceed, so she moved down the wall and stayed hidden. She'd been okay in her last class with Maddie there, but it seemed as if she'd be alone in this one.

There were a cluster of tables and she had no idea which to choose. Was there a seating plan? Did some people have a table that, like, belonged to them? Like in those no-maj movies. What if she sat down in someone's spot and they got mad at her?

Students came pouring in within minutes with no hesitation where they sat. As though they've been doing this for years. Which, of course, they had been. Some boys with yellow ties walked in and sat at a table on the far left. There was one spot left beside the boy who she dimly recognized from breakfast. ' _If no one's sitting there in another minute, I'll go over,_ ' Rose said to herself. While she counted to sixty in her head, Harry, Hermione and Ron walked through the door, heading to the table at the back very near to her hiding spot.

They seemed a little down. Harry was frowning and Hermione and Ron bickered about something. Rose immediately stopped counting and felt her stress level decrease. She could sit with them! She actually knew them.

Kind of.

They wouldn't send her away, would they? She didn't know them that well. Not like everyone else at this school did. Merlin, why did they have to move in the middle of their schooling? How would she ever make new friends when everyone already had good friends that they didn't need to replace and there was no space for her or her weird issues?

Well, of course, she _knew_ why they had left Canada.

Whatever. She cleared her head and resigned herself to ask if she could sit with them. If they said no, she would go over with the boys from her house. And if _they_ said no she'd find the nearest bathroom and try to drown herself.

She hardly even made it out of her gloomy corner before she heard it.

She would recognize that voice anywhere, _especially_ that tone.

"You fucking idiot! I can't believe anyone has let you live this long!" her high voice got louder with every word and shook with anger. Everyone in the classroom turned to the doorway, not wanting to miss out on the drama. "I really don't need you, you know, I could have asked Blaise. But thank you so much for showing me the way," she said in a mock polite way, stalking into the room with loud, slapping footsteps.

Within seconds their eyes met and everything felt okay again.

Nobody else in the room had even realized she was there, hiding in the dark, but she immediately knew Rose was there. Grace had never once overlooked Rose.

"Why are you lurking in the shadows like some psycho killer?" was the first thing Grace said.

Rose launched herself at her sister, careening her backward and just missing the guy she had been yelling at, who sauntered into the room as if he owned it, only to side-step just in time. Then just as quickly, Rose pulled away and started slapping Grace's arms.

"Where have you been? I've been worried sick! I didn't see you last night, I didn't see you this morning, for all I knew you could have died in your sleep! Did you even get up in time? Did you set your alarm? Did you make it to your first class? You better have –"

Grace pulled her back into a hug, pinning her arms down and whispered, "I missed you too."

The closing of the door echoed around the room and snapped everyone to attention. "Touching," sneered a voice, walking out of the shadows much like she had done a minute earlier. The man had black hair that hung in his face limply. His hooked nose seemed to protrude from his face like a beak, and Rose could not stop staring at it. "Stop wasting our time and sit down. Now."

The boy Grace walked in with snickered as the twins passed him, blond hair glinting in the candlelight as they headed towards the only people they knew; Harry Ron and Hermione. Rose threw Grace a look. Grace shook her head, as if to say _later._

They sat down at the table and started pulling out their cauldrons, Rose beaming at the trio because she was just so happy that she had found her sister, though she did not miss the look the three of them gave Grace. But before she could ask, Professor Snape started the lesson.

Now, Rose most definitely understood what everyone was talking about. Professor Snape talked slowly but surely, in a way that made you hang onto his every word. His tone was always cold, though he spoke softly, so softly that everyone had to be quiet in order to hear exactly what he was saying. As if his tone wasn't enough, his eyes were so dark that it seemed you could get stuck in them. There was an air around him though. He was sure of himself, but if you looked close enough, and if you knew what you were looking for you would see it; and Rose was very good at looking for it. Professor Snape was dark and painful and almost filled to the brim with misery.

Within the five minutes he spoke, Rose knew she would try her very best to avoid ever having to interact with him. He, like Professor Flitwick before him, spoke of the OWL's and how he only took the very best. Looking around, Rose saw a couple of students from every house. They all seemed positively tautwith nerves and fright, especially Neville. Grace and she however, slouched comfortably in their chairs. They didn't need to be nervous; they both excelled in Potions.

In fact, they did extremely well in pretty much all of their classes. At their old school, they were the top two students. It was only natural; they came from a very long line of powerful witches and wizards. Not that they let it get to their head, like _some_ people she could mention.

He wasn't even paying attention. He was writing notes to his sidekicks and laughing at his own jokes. And Professor Snape wasn't even doing anything about it; he ignored it, continuing with his spiel and glaring at Harry. Maddie had explained the blatant favouritism the Potions Master showed to his house, so even though Rose was fully expecting it, it was still startling to see a person with such authority being so very unfair.

"The potion you will be mixing today is one that does often come up in the Ordinary Wizarding Level: the Draught of Peace. This potion is used to calm anxiety and soothe agitation. How-ever," Professor Snape snapped the word into two and paused, flicking his eyes to Neville who gulped in his chair and gave an almost imperceptible shiver, "be warned: if you are too heavy-handed with the ingredients the drinker shall fall into a deep and sometimes even irreversible sleep; too stingy and the potion will have the opposite effect and the drinker will become enraged. Pay close attention to what you are doing." On Rose's left, Grace rolled her eyes and tapped her hand against her leg; one of her tell-tale signs of agitation. "You have an hour and a half... begin."

The classroom became a flurry of motion and muttering and odd sounds and spells. Everyone was in a hurry; Hermione had pushed passed many people to get her ingredients first; a Ravenclaw boy slipped and went sprawling on the floor, a cascade of materials following behind him; the Irish boy from the train set his robes aflame almost as soon as he started working (which, according to the responses of exasperated "Seamus!" 's, seemed to happen a lot.)

Rose went the long way around the classroom to the store cupboard, avoiding Professor Snape's dull anger directed towards the fallen Ravenclaw boy for "wasting precious ingredients and air" and the snickers of the Slytherins around him. Though, on the way back, with her arms filled with a variety of weird substances, she wished she had just _accio_ 'd the stuff when she found herself almost crashing into a sneering blond.

"Hoping to land another blow on me now, are you?" she spat, dancing away from the elbow that was too close for comfort. She had drowned her face in foundation that morning to not only cover up the bruise on her cheekbone but the huge bags under her eyes as well. His eyes were drawn to her clear cheek, then flicked up to meet hers. A pressing feeling started in her chest, kind of like she was having trouble breathing, and she did not like it one bit. Malfoy opened his mouth to say something, no doubt rude, but Rose brushed past him hastily.

"Finally," Grace exclaimed, dragging her feet off the table when Rose dumped the ingredients some seconds later. Rose gave her a look.

Mostly every other student had started already and all had the same look of concentration mixed with panic at both the time that was slipping away and the complicated instructions written in slanted cursive on the board. The twins however, were the complete epitome of the Draught of Peace.

They were very much familiar with this particular concoction, having watched their mother brew it too many times to count. Their mother was as much of an intellect as their dad was sociable. She was the brain of the family; having discovered and conquered any spell, potion and equation possible from school and even more so after graduating. For a witch of her potential, brewing the Draught of Peace was a trivial task.

It wasn't until late spring that the calming potion made a permanent spot on Kara's weekly brew list. But after the fourth night in a row of her sleep being disturbed by one or both twins waking up in a panicked cold-sweat, screaming their voices hoarse, she knew she had to do something. Before that, she had only made or purchased the Draught of Peace when Rose got into one of her really bad moods; where she was so infuriated and so deranged that nothing or no-one made sense and nothing or no-one could stop her.

So, while everyone else ironically panicked over the Draught of Peace, Rose and Grace added, stirred, heated or cooled comfortably and surely. They hardly even needed to look up at the board for instructions, and soon found themselves either caught up with the early-goers or passing them entirely. It took only half of their focus, which was good for them because they had a lot of catching up to do; after all, they had spent an entire evening apart.

"– and Filch was chasing the tablecloth around, screaming that he'd definitely expel it once he caught his breath. Thank fuck Daphne thought fast enough to charm it into a "ghost" or else I would have made a record of getting detention on the first day."

"Actually, Ron and Harry were almost expelled before they had even stepped foot in the castle in our second year for flying a car in broad daylight to Hogwarts and then crashing it into the Whomping Willow," said Hermione distractedly, crushing her porcupine quills in a vicious fashion and frowning at her notes.

"Right," Grace continued stirring her potion and looked weirdly at the trio, all in varying states of panic and disarray. "Anyway, we high-tailed it out of there and finally decided to head back, but then Tracey and Tulisa were hungry so we stole some cookies from the kitchen. They are heavenly, by the way. But, when we got back, get this, Pansy was chilling outside the entryway! I guess she followed us out, but then lost us and forgot the password. Which is so dumb because she's a prefect, but whatever. Basically, it was a really good first night. I think I'll like this place." Grace sighed happily, turning down the flame under her cauldron.

Rose didn't know what to say. While she had been lying in bed, wiping her tears on her already soaked pillow and overall wallowing in the unfairness and the unknown of life, Grace had been laughing and frolicking and causing trouble.

'Had she not thought of me at all? Did she wonder for one second what I was up to last night? How I felt after being put in a different house? How this was going to affect us at all?' Rose felt a heavy tiredness at her thoughts, the sleepless night catching up to her. 'Of course', she thought bitterly, stirring her potion a bit too angrily that some of it sloshed out onto the table, narrowly avoiding her notes, 'Grace is probably equally as sleepless, though for completely different reasons.'

"Woah there Rose, are you forgetting something? You have to add the powdered unicorn horn before you start stirring so much. Just a pinch... ya, that should be good."

Rose took a deep, hopefully calming, breath. "Thanks," she said through a strained smile.

"You ok?" Grace asked, looking away from her potion that was slowly turning purple to give Rose a concerned look.

Oh, now she wanted to be concerned.

"Fine," Rose forced the stupid weird emotions out and counted to ten, watching her potion go from red, to purple to a soft blue.

"Right... Well what did you do last night?"

Rose paused mid stir. "Oh, you know, nothing as exciting as what you got up to," she forced herself to laugh with Grace. "I was just so tired that I went to bed."

Grace frowned, and opened her mouth to say something, but Rose hurried on.

"But I did talk to my roommates for a bit, they seem pretty cool." Rose looked at the calming turquoise of her potion as she spoke, the air shimmering around them in a soft haze.

"Good," Grace relaxed with a smile. "It's a good thing we both have nice roommates."

Why had she lied? She could have told Grace the truth. They tell each other everything. She could have made Grace feel guilty; like look at all the emotions I have, why did you not think of me at all when all I could think about was how different everything was going to be between us?

Of course, it wasn't Grace's fault. She's just living her life. If she wants to go out and do fun things she should. She definitely should. Merlin knows she deserves it.

So why did Rose feel so weird about it?

She sighed and breathed in the soothing scent of the potion, watching the sparkle and dazzle of the unicorn horn as it dissolved. So transfixed was she on the hypnotizing twinkle of blue, purple, blue, purple, it took her a while to realize there was an ominous presence at their table, and that the rest of the room had gone silent. Rose tuned back just as Professor Snape vanished the contents in the cauldron belonging to a severely pissed off Harry.

She was beyond shocked. Can a teacher even do that? That had never happened at their old school. Rose turned to her sister, who sat with a look that was half parts disgusted half parts stunned.

"Those of you who have managed to read the instructions," Professor Snape looked around the rest of their table and actually had the audacity to nod at the twins, "fill one flagon with a sample of your potion, label it clearly with your name and bring it up to my desk for testing."

As he went to on to describe their homework, Rose filled her flagon, corked it and slammed it down onto the table. She was angry on Harry's account. What kind of teacher does that to a student? Though she hadn't been paying that much attention, she knew that Harry's potion was much better than whatever Ron had made, yet there he was, filling up his own flask and slopping it all over the table.

However, there was also a part of her that was secretly proud that Professor Snape had given her and her sister credit on their own potion. It made her feel guilty though, as it was probably only at Harry's expense that he had recognized them, like; look at these new kids, they're better than you, Potter.

For a second, she debated not handing it in, in an act of defiance.

But why would she do that? All she'd be doing is hurting herself. And her mark.

She was just very angry. Which didn't even make sense because this had nothing to do with her.

Ugh.

Rose got up a second after everyone else and deposited her bottle neatly on his desk. The bell rang for lunch just as she got back to her table, oddly warm in such a cold environment. She wanted to say something to Harry, but he bolted out of there as soon as the first note resonated. Hermione and Ron sighed in unison, packed up their stuff and went after him.

"Thank Merlin it's lunch already, I'm so hungry," Grace snapped her book shut, putting it into her newly cleaned cauldron and gracefully shrinking it so it fit into her bag. Rose started at the shutting of the book, flicking her eyes away from Harry's retreating back and focusing on copying down the homework –twelve inches of parchment on the properties of moonstone and its uses in potion-making, due on Thursday.

Just as she finished dotting the end of her sentence, there was a glint of light in her peripheral, a stark contrast compared to the dark dreariness of the potions classroom. Her eyes followed it, when she suddenly remembered something.

"–cookies will be there, I'm feeling something sweet as a pick me up."

Rose hurriedly shoved everything into her bag, wincing in the back of her mind at how the ink might smear, and turned pointedly to Grace.

"You never told me why you walked in with –"

"Malfoy!" Snape's voice barked, stopping the blond from slithering out the door. "Going somewhere?"

Malfoy's back stiffened, the only sign that he was bothered, for when he turned around his face was a blank mask of politeness. "Just lunch, sir. Potion-making makes me hungry," he said coolly.

"Fuck," breathed Grace. "I was hoping he'd make it out before the snake descended."

"You, know you're a snake now too," Rose whispered back, eyeing Malfoy and Snape.

"Aren't you forgetting something?" Snape's black eyes darted to the twins and back to the boy, who looked much more flustered now.

"Of course not sir, I just... was... making sure the hallways were cleared."

"Ya, but I'm like a cute snake, they're like... those poisonous ones that people want to kill."

"Snakes are venomous, not poisonous you dumbass."

"You weren't, perhaps, trying to slack on your duties of showing Miss Taylor around –which would include the Great Hall?"

"Sir," Grace protested, "I'm really quite alright. I don't need a guide to show me around this place, I'll be able to find everything on my own."

"Of course, Miss Taylor, which would be why you showed up late to your Transfiguration class, after walking into three wrong classrooms. If you don't wish to miss out on lunch, which, if I'm not mistaken," Professor Snape paused and looked to Grace with a smirk, "will include cookies, I would advise you to not argue."

"How did he possibly hear that," muttered Grace as she towed Rose behind her towards a disgruntled Malfoy, idly doing up the buttons to his jacket. "And how could he use my love of cookies against me? That's just so rude."

"You got stuck with Malfoy as your guide? How much bad luck do you have?"

"For starters, she has you as a sister so she's pretty worse off." Malfoy ushered them out of the potions room, slamming the door closed behind him.

Grace smiled. "He's a pleasant one, isn't he?"

The dungeons were like a maze. A long, cold, dreary maze. And with Malfoy leading the way, she didn't know if they were going to make it out alive.

"You've been attending this school for five years, your dormitory is down here, you trek this journey every day, and _now_ you decide to get lost?" Rose scowled fiercely, shivering in her wet robes and looking around at the stone walls that looked the same as the ones they had passed two minutes ago. In fact, she was pretty sure that tapestry was the same too.

"Well if you hadn't decided to piss off Peeves, he wouldn't have blocked the exit and I wouldn't be wasting my breath talking to you," Malfoy huffed, stalking forward even though they already knew nothing was there.

"How was I supposed to know what that idiot would do? I only asked if he could do something productive instead of trying to drown us, I didn't know that would cause him to go fucking crazy!"

Malfoy stopped suddenly and spun around to pin Rose with an irritated glare. "He's a sodding poltergeist, what did you think was going to happen?"

"Fuck if I know, we didn't have a poltergeist at our old school because we got an education at a normal fucking place."

"Right, well you Americans are obviously so much better than we are. If you liked it there, then why'd you leave? They kick you out?"

"American? _American?_ How fucking dare you! I sound nothing like an American, and I can't believe you would insult me to that degree. Americans are pig-headed and egotistical and I do not appreciate being classified as such. Bitch." Rose turned her head away, nose upturned and fire flashing in her eyes. Though, half of it were the actual torches on the wall reflected in her eyes. But still.

When she turned back, she saw Malfoy was grinning. It looked out of place on his face, as she'd only ever seen a frown or grimace or a sneer or a smirk or –well literally anything except a smile. It threw her off for a moment. Her eyes followed his hand as it moved his hair out of his face, only for it to flop right back over his eyes, and she had to shake herself out of whatever was happening.

"What are you smiling at? We're stuck down here because of you, now is not the time to get smiley," said Rose sourly.

His smile became a grimace as he looked around again. "Again, this is not my fault. This is your bloody fault and you know it."

Rose rolled her eyes. "Whatever. That can't be the only exit Malfoy. It would be a fire hazard."

"It's the only exit I've ever used," Malfoy shrugged and went back to examining the corridors. They were in the middle of an intersection of sorts; there were three other corridors they could go down; one straight ahead, one to the left and one to the right. Or, they could turn back around.

"What, no night roaming's? You never woke up in the middle of the night and thought 'Hey, maybe I should go scouting the dungeons in case I ever get stuck down here for some reason and my normal exit is blocked.' Obviously, because you never did that, this is all, completely, your fault." She hugged herself and shivered, leaning against the wall. The dungeons were damp enough by themselves, they didn't need a poltergeist with a bucket full of water balloons to help any.

She'd get a cold at this rate. Ugh. She hated being sick. They still got sick, though the immune systems of witches and wizards were far better than those of no-maj's. It was very infrequent, but it happened. And when it did, it sucked. Or sniffled, actually.

There was a sudden clacking noise that took her by surprise. Rose jumped to attention, only to realize they were her teeth. Fuck, that's embarrassing.

Looking up from the stone floor, she jumped again, but this time because of how close Malfoy was. When did he get there? She hadn't heard him.

Silently, he shrugged off his jacket –which was only slightly damp because he had used her as a shield from the water balloons –and offered it to Rose. She took it, hesitantly. It felt warm and silky, obviously made in the highest quality, and had a crest on it that she didn't recognize.

"... Thanks," she finally said as she slipped it on, already feeling better. It was much too long on her, the sleeves going over her hands and the ends passing her knees. Her fingers played around with the soft material of the cuff.

Malfoy raked his fingers through his damp hair again which looked browner somehow and nodded, not meeting her eyes. "Wouldn't want you to die of hypothermia. Someone would definitely blame me and I don't want to get caught up in that."

"Ya, Grace would definitely kick your –wait a second, where's Grace?"

They both looked around. There was no mane of hair to be seen.

In fact, thinking back, Rose hadn't heard Grace at all since Peeves had pelted them with water balloons. And then she got so preoccupied with being mad at Malfoy for being an idiot that she didn't even realize Grace wasn't there.

Holy shit.

She'd lost her sister.

How does someone lose their sister?

"Fuck. Fuck. Fuckity fuck fuck. We lost her. Holy Merlin how could we have lost her? This is all your fault you insufferable jerk!"

Malfoy didn't even seem bothered. In fact, he seemed rather amused at the turn of events. "I was wondering why it had become so quiet. Thank Merlin she's gone, her incessant talking is going to be the death of me."

"That would be a far better way to die than what I have planned for you," said Rose darkly, glaring so fiercely she felt as though she could have turned Malfoy to stone.

He seemed to have had the same thought. "Right, well, don't get your panties in a twist, we'll find her. We just have to retrace our footsteps," he said, taking a casual step back to put more space between just in case Rose decided to lunge.  
Which she was seriously debating.

Wow, he was actually kind of close. Why was that again? Oh right, the jacket. Rose sighed and took a deep breath, pawing at the sleeve. There was no point in hurting Malfoy; she had no idea how to get up to the Great Hall and he was her best bet. Besides, she'd get into serious trouble.

Again.

"We'll head back to where we last saw her and start there. And please, do try to keep up, I know you have short legs but think about what were to happen if she were in trouble, heh?" Malfoy walked briskly ahead of Rose, so she couldn't see the smirk on his face, but she could definitely hear it. Merlin did she want to smack it off.

Rose strode a foot behind him with her heart in her stomach. She knew that Malfoy was only trying to get a rise out of her, but what if Grace really were in trouble and Rose wasn't there?

Merlin, she was a bad sister. There she was, fighting with _Malfoy_ of all people while Grace was, well, wherever she was. She definitely should have noticed she was missing earlier. Guilt and worry followed behind her as she speed-walked to catch up with Malfoys long legs, stumbling clumsily when his jacket got caught between her knees.

In between the rhythmic slapping of their footsteps against the stone floors, she thought she heard a noise. Rose yanked on the back of Malfoys robes –hard. (Harder than necessary but really, what was a girl to do?)

"Ow? The bloody hell are you doing Taylor?"

"Shh! Do you hear that?"

"Hear what? There's nothing to bloody hear because there is no one else down here as they were all lucky and didn't get stuck with a raving lunatic–OW! Did you just bite me?"

If Rose wasn't so worried about where Grace was, she would have laughed at the face Malfoy was making.

"You just bit my shoulder. Why did you just bite my shoulder? Oh I know, it's because you're _fucking insane_!"

"Oh, stop your whining. Do you hear something too?"

He glowered at her, but preceded to shut up and look around, all the while rubbing his bitten shoulder.

It was faint, but it was definitely there. Talking. Well, screaming really. A bit on the hysterical side.

"Those bitches fucking left me here. I'm probably rat bait in this cold, smelly... dungeon thingy. And there's a window right fucking there, but I'm too fucking short to reach it. Damn my genetics! I'm all hair! What am I supposed to do with hair? It's wet! And gross! I'm going to have to put in a hair mask when I get out... if I get out!"

Yep. That was definitely Grace. But where was she? It was all stone wall. Unless...

There was a tapestry that they had passed a couple of times. Rose had just assumed that there was nothing behind it. But what if she were wrong?

Rose marched right up to it, while Malfoy looked at her as though she were insane, which, she guessed, she had done nothing of late to prove him wrong.

It was a nice tapestry. Obviously old with all the dust hidden in the wrinkles of the fabric. And because it was hanging in the dungeons of Hogwarts. It displayed the powerful wizard Merlin gazing up at a brilliant array of stars in deep wonder. His hair was as white as a unicorn's mane, especially compared to the darkness of the night. The stars were arranged in a way that she knew if she were any good at divination, she'd be able to read them. Of course, Grace was the one who excelled in that field.

There were four orbs surrounding Merlin, each different colours and sporting a unique symbol. The one near his head was a shimmering violet with an eye in it that seemed to pierce her soul; to his right, the orb glowed bright yellow and shone like the sun that was carved into it; near his feet was a dull green with beautiful vivacious flowers sprouting out of it like spring blooming; and the final orb seemed to be coming out of his wand in a fiery blue explosion, sparks etched into it like fireworks.

Rose was transfixed. There was just something about the tapestry that both terrified and intrigued her. The orbs seemed impossibly familiar, though she was sure she had never seen them in her life. Her eyes bore into Merlin's. She could have sworn they were trying to tell her something, something important. But how ridiculous was that? It was an old tapestry, long forgotten in the halls of the dungeons, and unlike portraits, could not move. So then why did it look like Merlin was winking at her?

"–my first day of classes and I literally got stuck in a dungeon. This is beyond ridiculous. All I wanted were some cookies. Was that too much to ask for? And Malfoy is so fucking useless. All he had to do was lead us to the Great Hall, but no. He can't even do that right. You know, I should just kill him. Do the whole world a favour and kill him. I can think of ways to do it right now since I'm literally NEVER GOING TO GET OUT OF HERE."

"I'd like to see you try you big-headed twat!" snarled Malfoy, pushing Rose out of the way and ripping the tapestry to the side.

The sudden dim light from the torches visibly surprised Grace, who was leaning against the wall of what looked like a very narrow passageway. The sight of her sister made Rose forget the tapestry entirely, and rushed towards her like she hadn't seen her in years.

Grace had very different plans, however.

"Wha– Grace no!" Rose exclaimed as she was pushed, once again, to the side.

Grace lunged around Rose and reached for Malfoy's throat.

Malfoy was definitely not expecting anything physical. He had his wand drawn and his eyes widened in horror as Grace's hand came closer to his throat. Or it could have been because of the crazy look in her eyes as she whispered "I'm going to fucking kill you."

Well shit. Why did Grace always have to go for the theatrics? Rose cast a quick protective wall between the two. Grace hit her hand on it a mere foot away from Malfoy, who had his eyes shut tight and a look of resigned fright etched on his face. Rose snorted. What a frickin coward.

Grace looked betrayed as she turned to Rose, cradling her hand, and pouted. "Why'd you do that? We could have been rid of him forever."

Rose sighed as Malfoy peeked one eye open. "We've talked about this before. You can't just "choke" someone you just met. You need to have their permission. And you need to stop being so dramatic."

Grace smirked, cocking her head to the side as if considering Malfoy. "Meh, I bet he wouldn't mind it if I did choke him. I know I wouldn't mind being choked."

Malfoy looked questioningly between the two as Rose made a disgusted face.

"What is your bloody problem, you crazy woman?"

The smirk on her face dropped as soon as he opened his mouth. "You two left me in there to die! That's my problem!"

"That's not true! We've been looking for you this entire time."

"Really? Because you passed me by six times without noticing I was gone."

"I –well... we had to run from Peeves? And anyway, how did you even get in there? And why didn't you just come back out?"

"Do you really think I'm that dumb? If I could have gotten out of here, I would have, but as soon as the tapestry covers the entrance, it's like a barrier. You're trapped. And no amount of pushing or shoving or whatever will make it budge."

Well that didn't bode well for them, considering they were all behind the tapestry now. Malfoy pushed against the curtain, punched it, kicked it, tried to blast a hole in it with his wand, but to no avail. The only light came from Grace's lit wand and the small window just out of reach, which showed a very nice view of a patch of dirt. Rose cast her own _lumos maxima_ and a ball of light emerged from her wand and hung from the ceiling like a chandelier. It didn't show much, only that this tunnel like thing went on much farther and then tapered off into darkness, and Malfoys scared face. That made her feel at least a bit better.

"See what I mean? There's no way to get out the way we came in. And I didn't really feel like going down there to my doom all by myself, so..." Grace leaned against the wall, arms crossed casually.

"Ya, I get it." Rose said, looking around for some kind of way out that they perhaps had overlooked.

"Why are you wet?" Grace asked suddenly, touching Rose's damp hair.

"Why are you dry?" Rose countered, twirling one frizzy curl on her sister's head.

"I know why she's wet." The smirk was evident in his tone that it didn't even matter he was in the shadows. They all knew it was there. Is that all he ever did? Smirk?

Grace stifled a laugh as Rose punched Malfoy's arm. "Shut up Malfoy."

"Oww, stop with the abuse already. What is with you North Americans and physical violence?" he rubbed his arm, scowling at the pair.

"You're just a special case," Rose smiled wickedly at him. He just rolled his eyes. "Ok, no but actually, why are you dry? You were with us when Peeves attacked, weren't you?"

Grace blew a piece of hair from her face. "Kind of. That's actually when you guys lost me. I think. I think Peeves was trying to throw something at us, but then Malfoy rammed into me and I went flying through the tapestry."

"That's because he was cowering behind me from the water balloon attack. Such a chivalrous guy we have with us," Rose said dryly.

"That jacket you're wearing is very expensive! Water is damaging to the silk, there was no way I was going to ruin it because you're a bloody idiot and can't keep her mouth shut."

"Wait time out, what jacket?" Grace squinted through the dim lighting, finally taking in what her sister was sporting. "Why are you wearing his jacket?" she asked, incredulous.

Rose fiddled awkwardly with the sleeve again. She had forgotten she was wearing his jacket. Was it that big of a deal? Looking back towards Malfoy again, with his arrogant, tilted chin and his crossed arms, she decided that yes, it was a big deal. Why had she agreed to wear something of his? He's such an ass.

"I was really cold ok? What was I supposed to do? I'd rather he freeze than me."

"Well if that's how you feel, then I will very well have that back, thank you." He held out his hands for the jacket, a weird look on his face. Grace watched Rose take it off and thrust it towards him in astonishment.

"Um.. why didn't you just cast a drying charm?"

"..."

"Rose, you're really quite an idiot," she quickly did the spell. Rose told herself the only reason her cheeks were blushing was because of the sudden heat.

"Right, well now can we focus on getting out of here? I would really rather not be stuck down here with either of you for any longer. Or," he shuddered at the thought, "be found with you."

"The feeling's mutual."

They all looked towards the dark end of the passageway. "Well, I mean, we could try to find out how far this thing goes and where it ends."

Malfoy coughed a little, probably trying to cover a whimper. "Um, no way. We don't know what's down there! There could be another three-headed dog just waiting for someone stupid enough to get themselves stuck in here."

"As if there would be a –wait _another_? You mean there's already a three-headed dog here? What kind of school have we come to?" Grace asked shrilly.

"Well," Malfoy shuffled his feet, "there were rumors in first year."

Rose rolled her eyes and kept eyeing the part of the hallway where the light stopped reaching and it turned dark. In her imagination, she could think of a whole bunch of awful monsters that could be waiting for them, hidden in the shadows, lurking and ready, just waiting for them to step out and –

She shook her head. She was getting way ahead of herself.

"Well they let you go here, Malfoy, so I suppose anything really is possible," Rose smirked. Malfoy responded with a rude hand gesture.

"Ok, well if we don't want to go down there, then what if we climb out of the window? I was too small by myself, but with the three of us, we could probably make it," Grace pointed.

They really were stupid. Here it was, staring them straight in the face the entire time they were in there and they never even thought to try and use it before. It could have saved Rose precious moments of not being in Mafoy's presence.

"Malfoy, get down on all fours underneath the window."

He gaped at Rose. "Hell no! It's dirty and wet and these are brand new robes, I'm not going to get them ruined just because some half-blood bitch tells me to," he sniffed.

Well then. Rose shook with barely contained anger. He was one of _those_ kinds of people, was he? All blood status and masculine superiority. Well, ok then. He messed with the wrong fucking witch.

Rose repressed her dark, inner thoughts of what she could do to him in five seconds that would make sure no one would ever find him again, and instead regarded him coolly.

Grace put her hand on her shoulder. An anchor.

She sighed quietly, eyes never leaving the cold grey ones. "Fine. If you don't do as I say, then I will chain you down here to rot until the rats find you."

"As if you could," scoffed Malfoy, though his eyes did flicker to the wand she was fiddling with in her hand.

Rose smirked and rose one eyebrow. "Try me."

He didn't budge. He still stood there with his cocky sneer and arrogant attitude. Well, she'd just have to take him down a notch.

The red light of her stunning spell missed his ear by an inch. On purpose of course.

The change in his face was instantaneous. The horror that spread through his eyes gave Rose a tiny thrill, though she beat it down in a heartbeat.

"Wha –but –you can't do that!"

Rose laughed a little. "Can't I? There's no one here to see, and –if you get out of here –and tell anyone, who are they to believe? An obnoxiously arrogant bully? Or two new, innocent students? You decide."

Malfoy looked about ready to shit himself. Serves him right, the racist, misogynistic asshole. Grace squeezed her shoulder, a silent message telling her that that was enough. Probably too far actually, but whatever.

Rose sighed and pulled back. "So, are you going to help, or are you going to get in the way?"

There was an audible gulp, and then he begrudgingly did as she said, all the while glaring at her fiercely.

"Now there's a good boy," she belittled even more. Grace huffed a tiny laugh, but Rose could tell she was at least a little bit displeased with her actions. It worked though, didn't it?

"Shut it, you insane lunatic," Malfoy grumbled from the floor.

"And you say I'm dramatic," Grace whispered in her ear. Rose merely shrugged.

"So I'll climb on top of Malfoy, and then Grace, you'll climb over me and that should be good to reach the window. You'll have to hoist us up though."

"I have no upper body strength, how is this going to work?"

"Well I don't know, but it's going to have to because I am hungry and tired and I just want to get out of here and away from this asshole."

Said asshole did another rude hand gesture.

"Fine," Grace grumbled.

Malfoy tensed up as Rose gently got up on his back. From her new height, she was almost at the window. If her family weren't so frickin short, they wouldn't need another body to be able to reach. "Ready?" she asked Grace, cupping her hands into a makeshift hold.

"I guess."

"Ok, three, two, one." Grace put her shoe in Rose's hands and she thrust up, pushing her sister upward with as much power as she could manage. Malfoy groaned under them in obvious discomfort.

"You're fine," Rose panted to him under the strain. "We're not that heavy."

"Says you," he managed through clenched teeth.

"I got it!" yelled Grace as she shimmied onto the ledge of the window and pulled herself up.

"Thank fuck," Rose muttered, clenching and unclenching her hands, the imprint of the soles of her sisters boots visible.

Malfoy rolled to the side, throwing Rose off his back. "Ok, get off of me now."

Rose glared from her new position on the floor, and jumped when the bang of the window echoed around the hallway.

They both looked up to find the window half smashed and off its hinges, glass covering the ledge. "Oops?" said Grace.

"Push it all out onto the ground before we try to get up, ok?"

When it was all clean, Malfoy stood under the window, staring up with a calculating look. "It would be easier for you to reach it if you climb onto my shoulders," he said to the wall.

Rose was hesitant, but she had to agree. It was the only way she'd be tall enough.

"Fine."

Slowly, she walked over to him, eyeing him the entire way. He held out his hands behind him, in the position of a piggy back. She sighed. Merlin did she not want to do this.

"We don't have all day guys, the cookies could be gone by the time we get there!" Grace called down to them. Rose glowered at her sister, but took a running leap onto Malfoys back.

She thought he would falter under her new weight but he was solid and steady. "Now lean your hands against the wall to support you, and slowly climb up to my shoulders," he whispered. She tried to do as he said, but the closeness of their bodies was getting to her. She had never been this close to a boy before. If she stilled, with her arms around his neck and her front pressed to his back, she bet she would be able to feel his heart beat. It was unnerving.

So she slowly made her way up, though it was awkward the entire time. His hands guided her, holding onto her arms as she went, then her legs and finally anchoring her feet. It was way too intimate to her, and especially with Malfoy, the person who not even five minutes ago had been so insulting. She didn't dare breathe until the only part of her that touched him were her shoes planted on his shoulders. Then, she took a deep, calming breath.

"Ok, so I fashioned a rope and tied it onto one of the trees. It should hold if you want to use it to climb up," Grace's voice brought her back and she focused on the rope that was suddenly dangling in front of her face.

"Where did you get the rope?" she asked as she took it in both her hands and gave a testing tug. It seemed to be ok.

"I made it, duh."

"Well why didn't we think of that before!" Rose exclaimed as she took one foot off of Malfoys shoulders and rested it on the wall. She was a little afraid actually, as she started "walking" up the wall. One slip of her hand and she would flatten Malfoy like a pancake. Actually, maybe that wouldn't be such a bad thing.

"Because then I couldn't enjoy watching you get all cozy with Malfoy down there," whispered Grace with a shit-eating grin. If Rose wasn't so busy with her hands, she would have flipped her off.

It was very difficult work. Trying to keep straight with very little upper body strength and rope burn was tiring, but she didn't have that far to go. Thanks to Malfoys height, she was almost at the top within a minute, and all Grace had to do was try and pull her up. Finally, the two sisters made it and rolled outside in a heap.

They looked at each other, panting, for a second, and then burst into peals of laughter. The sun was bright in the sky overhead, especially compared to the darkness of the passageway, so Rose had to squint out into the day. They were somewhere near the main entrance, if she remembered the location of coming in last night. The two finally stopped laughing when Grace cringed a little in discomfort and touched her head.

"Just a bit of a headache from the sudden brightness," Grace answered the unasked question. "It's nothing really, I was probably just in the dark for too long."

Rose nodded, but was not a hundred percent convinced. Though her interrogation had to wait as there was a yell from below.

"Hello, are you two perhaps forgetting something? Yes I am still here, thank you very much, you can't get rid of me that easily."

"What a shame," Grace muttered as they crawled back to the broken window and peered down.

He was trying his best, she had to give him that. He was climbing up the rope with more grace than she at least but the strain was evident in his face. He was almost at the top, but he looked exhausted. Probably from keeping both of them up. She felt as though she should help him. It was the right thing to do, right?

Her hand appeared in his face and he blinked up at it with distrust. "Oh c'mon, I'm not going to hurt you, where would you get that idea?"

"Hmm, I wonder," he grunted, still staring at her hand.

"Ok, I guess I can give you that one. But I would never intentionally hurt you... only scare you. You'd have to actually be trying something for me to do some harm." She sighed. "Either take my hand or don't, I really don't care."

With a few more glances, he finally put his hand in hers, and a jolt went up her arm. Obviously from his added weight. Of course. Because what else could it be. Absolutely nothing is what.

She struggled to get him up onto the ledge, heaving and pulling, but with his effort and hers, they finally managed it. With the three of them finally out, they sat in the dirt and looked up at the sun, with its glorious rays that warmed them instantly and made them feel safe.

Rose put her head on Grace's, and let the calm engulf her. It was so peaceful; no yelling or arguing or teasing or even just talking. It was quiet and still. It was perfect.

And then Grace's stomach rumbled.

It was silent for one second after that, but then all three of them laughed in a way that made them feel connected. It was weird. Rose and Grace laughed this way all the time, but it felt as though they were showing Malfoy a piece of them by letting him laugh with them. Which was weird because laughing is laughing and everyone is allowed to laugh so why was it a big deal? Rose didn't know, but it made her abruptly stop. The other two stopped as well, but there was still a hint of a smile on their faces. It made Malfoy look so much nicer, Rose decided. He didn't look so arrogant, or conceited, or rude, or –he just looked better.

"We still have some time before our afternoon classes if you guys want to eat," Malfoy said, checking his watch and standing. He stretched, and with the sun behind him, it kind of looked like there was a halo around him. Rose really needed to eat, the hunger was making her delirious.

Grace hopped up and all but sprinted towards the doors. "Yes! I am so hungry I could eat... something really big and excessive that I can't think of right now."

Rose laughed as she watched her sister disappear behind the doors. She was such a weird goof. She hummed a tune under her breath and walked along merrily, until she realized that Malfoy was right behind her. Fuck, how could she have forgotten him?

This is so awkward. What was she supposed to say to him? Sorry for kinda almost hitting you with a spell but also not because you were being a complete asshole? Or maybe, thanks for helping because we probably couldn't have gotten out without you? Or even, hey, I don't really know where we stand at the moment because we are most definitely not friends but I feel as though now I should maybe be a little nicer to you though I doubt you will be nice to me? Ya, ok.

Rose sped up almost imperceptibly, trying to reach the doors just a little bit faster so she wouldn't have to say anything to him. Why does Grace always leave me in these awful situations?

Just as she was reaching for the handle, a hand softly touched her shoulder and she stopped short. It had to have been Malfoy, but why would he willingly touch her?

She turned slowly, cautiously, towards him. She didn't really know what to expect. But it definitely wasn't for him to brush his thumb over her cheek.

"I'm sorry," he told the ground, in a way that made her feel like those words didn't normally come out of his mouth. She was confused. Sorry for what? There was a lot to be sorry for, but what was it at this particular time? She ran her own hands over her face, trying to figure it out, when she felt a sharp pain.

Oh. Right. She had forgotten about that. But hadn't she covered it?

A look at her reflection in the window showed that the water balloons of Peeves' did more damage than she thought. Her hair was messy, having dried weirdly and her mascara ran down her face in a horror movie way. But the purple bruise on her cheek was what really popped. It was much bigger and more colourful than this morning, but it was proudly on display. She needed to get better setting spray apparently.

"I didn't mean to hit you with the door. It was an accident. And I know I should have said sorry after the fact, but ... I don't know. I don't normally say this kind of thing just.. I don't know. Just sorry, I guess." His voice was small and he still refused to look up at her, which was totally fine because she had no idea how to arrange her face at that moment.

Rose was very much surprised. She didn't think he had any emotion other than arrogance and cowardice. And then he looked her in the eye. His grey was light in the sun, almost blue, and he looked so vulnerable that Rose had to take a huge breath. It was gone as soon as it came though, that one flicker of emotion. Within the time it took her to exhale, Malfoy went back to his normal haughty expression, and took a step back.

They continued to stare at each other for a minute, and then he swiftly side-stepped her and walked inside, not once looking back.


End file.
